


A Little More Functional Than We Thought

by BleedingInk



Series: Functional Families Are Overrated [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: De-Aged Castiel, De-Aged Crowley, De-Aged Meg, Domestic, F/M, Gen, Teen!Castiel, Teen!Meg, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-23
Updated: 2015-10-09
Packaged: 2018-04-05 19:07:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 25
Words: 73,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4191507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BleedingInk/pseuds/BleedingInk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been four years since Rowena cast the spell that turned Meg and Castiel into kids, forcing Dean and Sam to "adopt" them. The children are growing up fast now, so the Winchesters are going to have to rise up to the challenge of caring for two overpowered teenagers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Changes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Qzil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qzil/gifts).



An unholy shriek echoed down the halls of the bunker. Dean jumped from his bed and fall sprawled out onto the floor. Before he could even get back on his feet, the screaming began again, and this time, Dean’s half-awake brain started registering a couple of things about it: it was acute and loud, unmistakable female… and it was coming from the kid’s room.

“Meg!” he shouted. He barely had time to reach for the gun underneath his pillow when Castiel burst into the room. His blue eyes were open with sheer horror and filled to the brim with unshed tears.

“Dean, come quick!” he said. “There’s a lot of blood and Meg is…”

Dean didn’t need to be told twice. He passed by the small angel and ran down the hall, holding the gun to his face, ready to shoot to hell whatever the fuck it was that had invaded his home and was upsetting his kids. Nobody messed with his family, and especially not that early on a Saturday morning.

The door of the kid’s room was barely cracked open. He could hear Meg crying out in pain inside. He didn’t hesitate: he kicked it and jumped inside, looking around rapidly to detect any possible threats.

There were none, however. What there was in there, however, was a teenage demon wriggling with both arms over her lower stomach, with Sam kneeling next to her trying to talk her down.

“Meg, please,” he was saying, with a hand on Meg’s head. “I need you to calm down and talk to me. Where does it hurt?”

“EVERYWHERE!” Meg howled.

“What’s wrong with her?” Dean asked, lowering the gun but still not entirely sure he should put it aside. “Cas said there was blood. Is she hurt?”

“Uh, no,” Sam said. “It’s just… well, it’s…”

Dean stared at him, waiting for his brother to explain himself better, but Sam seemed to be at lost for words. In the end, he just pulled down the sheets to reveal a big, ugly red stain. After swallowing down the vomit that reached his throat, Dean took a step closer to the bed trying to determine the source. Meg’s pajamas pants were soaked in blood, but she didn’t seem to be wounded, despite the fact that her sobbing indicated that she was in unbearable pain. But she was a demon, what could possibly…?

Slowly, it started to dawn on him.

“Oh, no.”

“Oh, yes,” Sam confirmed with a grave nod. “Our little demon has finally reached womanhood.”

“I HATE YOU!” Meg cried out.

 

* * *

 

Two hours later, Dean was at the pharmacy trying to determine how much ibuprofen would be enough to relieve Meg’s cramps. By the way her metabolism worked and how loud she was shouting that she was going to murder them all and baked them into pies when he left, he figured it would be safer to just take the whole lot and pushed all the boxes on the shelf into his basket.

If he had to be honest with himself, it hadn’t been _completely_ unexpected. Four years had passed since Rowena’s spell, and personally, he hadn’t had a row of such good years in a while. Yes, they rarely did any hunting anymore, unless things that went bump in the night somehow found their way into their town or within a day’s drive radio, assuming Charlie was available to babysit.

But it wasn’t like they didn’t have excitement to throw around. Meg and Castiel were slowly recovering most of their powers, which meant sometimes they got out of control and they had to come up with a convoluted explanation for the very confused teachers. “Yes, Castiel has always been that fast. And sneaky. He’s like a little ninja.” Or: “No, I’m not saying your son is a liar, but are you certain that he saw Meg’s eyes do that? Maybe it was the angle of the sun…”

Dean suspected it had to do with the fact they had finally starting to show some signs of growth. The marks on the door had finally surpassed doorknob height, and they’d had gone to go for shopping several times when Meg’s shirt had begun to grow tighter around the chest and when Castiel’s jeans stopped covering his legs.

The little angel was actually not that little anymore. He had grown into a lanky boy, and his face had lost most of its baby fat. The result was that his features had become sharper, and a lot more similar to those of the grown angel Dean had met in the first place. Especially now that he had such a serious expression in his face as he followed him around.

“Are you sure Meg is going to be alright?” he kept asking. “She was hurting badly and…”

“She’ll be fine, Cas,” Dean said as he stopped in the female hygiene section and paused to contemplate where had his life gone so wrong that he was forced to contemplate the thousands of options displayed in front of him. “It’s just a thing that women go through. It’s perfectly natural…”

“I am well aware of how the female menstrual cycle works, Dean,” Castiel said, loud enough for several buyers around to turn their heads in his direction. “What I’m asking if it’s going to be like this every month.”

Dean swallowed. He hadn’t thought about that. Oh, God, that was nearly not enough ibuprofen. Hell, he was pretty sure there wasn’t enough ibuprofen in town to help Meg out of this one.

“We should stop for ice cream on the way home,” he said. “Tons of ice cream. _All_ of the ice cream.”

“Ice cream might not be the best idea,” Castiel said, after taking a quick glance at his cellphone. “It says here that the best way to relief the menstrual cramps is with something warm, so maybe the adequate thing to buy would be some sort of tea.”

“Okay, first, stop talking about it so loudly,” Dean said, all too aware of the people who were glancing in their direction while he spoke. “Second, do you really picture Meg drinking tea? Especially when she’s in such a… let’s say, sensitive state?”

Castiel reflected about it for a moment. He picked one of the boxes from Dean’s basket, and spent the better part of two minutes reading all of the ingredients. He then counted them with a preoccupied expression.

“Are we buying enough of these?”

 

* * *

 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, oh,” Meg complained, lying in the couch with clean pajamas and all wrapped up in blankets. “I’m going to kill Rowena. This is all her fault. I am going to rip all her hair out and then I’m going to set her head on fire…”

Sam, who had been hearing her whine for the past ten minutes, sat by her side and patted her in the head.

“I thought you were a badass demon that had endured all the tortures hell had to offer,” he said, trying to cheer her up.

“DO NOT QUESTION ME, SAM WINCHESTER!” Meg barked. “IF I SAY THIS IS WAY WORSE, IT’S BECAUSE IT IS!”

“Okay, okay,” Sam said, raising his hands in defeat. “I didn’t mean that you weren’t right. I’m just saying it’s a little bit funny that you consider puberty a torture worse than hell.”

Meg raised her eyes at her. They were foggy because of the pain, but they were still glimmering with unbridled fury.

“When I’m done with Rowena, you’re next,” she promised. “And who gave you permission to stop touching my hair?”

Sam bit back a chuckle, because she was sure Meg was going to make good on her threat, and started running his fingers through her long locks once again. She was going to need a haircut again, but he was going to wait until she was in a better mood to bring that up. His phone vibrated inside his pocket at the same time _Mephistopheles_ jumped on the couch, trying to find out what was wrong with his mistress. Meg put her arms around the cat’s neck and held him to her chest so tight he hissed in protest.

“Dean asks what flavor of ice cream would you like.”

“Ice cream?” Meg repeated.

“Yes, ice cream,” Sam said. “He’s at the store now with Cas, he says…”

“Why the fuck would I want ice cream?!” Meg shouted. “Don’t you know that this shit is supposed to get better with heat? Is the ice cream hot, Sam?”

“Well, no it’s…”

“It’s cold!” Meg interrupted him. “I don’t want ice cream!”

“Alright, I’ll tell him that…” Sam began to text.

“I want peanut butter.”

“Peanut butter?”

“Didn’t you hear me?” she asked. “Last time I checked you had ears. Now tell your brother to come back with peanut butter or not come back at all.”

“He does live here, you know,” Sam pointed out.

“He won’t need a place to leave when I rip his beating heart out of his chest with my bare hands,” Meg replied, gripping _Mephistopheles_ tighter since the cat was trying to wriggle his way out.

Sam made a mental note to hide all sharp objects in the bunker and prepare some Devil Traps. Just in case.

 

* * *

 

Despite Dean’s warning, Castiel practically ran down the stairs with the grocery bags and into the library to find Meg laying in the couch and whining under her breath.

“How are you feeling, Meg?”

“Peachy,” she growled.

“Well, I’m glad you’re better,” he said, her sarcasm flying over his head as usual. He opened one of the bags and extracted a jar. “We got your peanut butter.”

“GIVE IT TO ME!”

“Hey, hey, hey!” Dean shouted when Meg tear the lid off the jar. “You stop that right now! You’re going to spill it all over the couch!”

Sam half expected Meg to start shouting all sort of unholy tings she was going to do to Dean. Instead, she slowly and carefully sank her fingers on the peanut butter, took a big chunk of it and put it on her mouth, all the time staring at Dean straight in the eye as if she was defying him to try and stop her.

Dean swallowed loudly.

“On second thought, just do whatever makes you feel better,” he said.

“Good,” Meg replied, leaving the jar on the ground. “I’m going to take a bath now, and I’m going to use up all the hot water. You got a problem with that?”

“Not at all,” Dean said, taking a step backwards. “Seriously, Meg, just… just don’t break anything, okay? There’s no need for senseless violence.”

Meg stood up and marched up to the bathroom without making any promises. Castiel picked up the peanut butter and put the lid on it because, as he said, Meg would probably want the rest of it later.

“Come on, _Whiskers_ ,” he called his cat. “Let’s put the ice cream away before it melts.”

“You bought ice cream anyway?” Sam asked.

“I’m hungry,” Castiel shrugged.

“How can you be hungry? You had two plates of bacon for breakfast!”

“Well, I am,” Castiel shrugged. “It’s strange. It seems like I’m digesting a lot faster these days. Are there any leftovers from dinner? I’m going to snack on that, if you don’t mind.”

Before Sam could protest he wasn’t supposed to snack between foods, Castiel was already on his way to the kitchen, with _Mister Whiskers_ rubbing against his ankles.

“Look at this thing!” Dean said, holding the sheets high for Sam to see as soon as they walked in the washing room. The bloodstains were still there, although fainter than before. “This is going to take forever to come out!”

“Perhaps you should try another wash cycle?” Sam suggested.

“That’s going to ruin the sheets,” Dean complained.

Sam leaned against the wall as his brother rambled and whined about stains and soaps. The truth was that those things were the lasts in Sam’s mind.

“So, I was thinking,” he started when Dean stopped to catch his breath. “Maybe it’s time we give Meg a room.”

“She has a room,” Dean answered, obviously not paying attention to Sam as he folded the clothes that didn’t need to go back into the machine.

“Yeah, but I mean, a room on her own,” Sam said. “Separated from Castiel. They should both have their own spaces.”

Dean turned towards his brother, clearly confused.

“Why? They’ve been sharing a room since… this whole mess began,” he pointed out.

“Yes, and that was okay when they were children,” Sam said. “But now they’re growing up, their hormones are kicking in, and it’s going to be kind of… improper.”

It finally dawned on Dean what his brother was trying to say.

“Oh, you mean they could…? Like, really?” he asked, laughing nervously. “Nah, they’re just… they’re just kids, they couldn’t…”

“Do you remember what you were like when you were fourteen?” Sam asked, crooking an eyebrow in his direction.

Dean stopped for a second to reflect on it. He shuddered.

“Cas should get his own room,” he suggested. “I mean, I don’t think Meg will be in the mood to move all her stuff out, you know? It’s not like we ever got her to do anything she didn’t want. And maybe we should wait a few days until her whole… issue, has passed before we tell them.”

“Good idea,” Sam approved, with curt nod.

After turning the washing machine on, Dean moved on to the kitchen to make dinner… wherein he found Castiel with his head on the table and several empty plates scattered around on the table.

“Did you eat all of that?” Dean asked, half-horrified, half-impressed.

“I am so full, yet I’m still hungry,” Castiel whined. “Why am I so hungry, Dean?”

“Don’t worry about it, buddy,” Dean said, palming him in the shoulder. “It just means you have the appetite of a growing boy. It’ll pass.”

“Really?” Castiel lifted his eyes at him. There was a red spot right in the middle of his forehead that Dean guessed was going to bloom into an ugly pimple within the next few days. “When?”

“Give it four or five more years.”

Castiel let out a long, drawn out moan and sank his head between his arms again.

Dean chuckled for a moment, and then a horrible thought occurred to him: if their powers were coming back in full force because they were growing up, and if they were about to go through that magical age of unstable emotions and raging hormones, that meant there would be a lot more calls from school, and a lot more convoluted explanations to plan out, and a lot more chaos going on around his house.

Sam walked in a minute later to find his brother staring into the void while Castiel groaned in pain but continued to shove ice cream into his mouth. Sam decided not to ask.


	2. Ambush

They let a couple of weeks go by before they sat the little monsters in the kitchen table and explained to them their reasons for what they were about to do.

“So, you know, you’re not children anymore…”

“We were never children to begin within,” Castiel replied, matter-of-factly. “I’m still millions of years old despite my appearance and Meg is…”

“The point we’re trying to make here,” Dean cut him off. “It’s that… well, you don’t know how human puberty works, and by the looks of it, that is what we’re going to have to deal with here.”

“There’s going to be a lot of feelings you’ve never experienced before involved,” Sam continued. “And it may not be such a good idea for you two to… well…”

His voice trailed off, unsure of how to continue. Dean opened his mouth to take it from there, but Meg shot him such a horrified look that he couldn’t do it.

“Oh, fuck no!” she complained. “Are you trying to give us ‘the talk’?” she said, drawing air quotes with her fingers.

“What talk?” Castiel asked looking confused at both Meg and the Winchesters.

“Look, we just want you guys to be responsible about this,” Dean said. “Things are going to change crazily in the next year or so. You’re starting high school, is a whole new ambient and you are…”

“Yeah, yeah, we get it,” Meg said. “It’s not going to be a walk in the park for us either. We’re the ones who are going to be stuck five days a week in a building full of smelly tweens and underpaid professors so tired of life that they’d pay to _not_ be there.”

“Yeah, good times,” Dean sighed, nostalgically.

Castiel and Meg stared at them, as if they were inviting them to go on.

“But that is not what this is about,” Dean continued. “This is about you two… and the preoccupying lack of space in between.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Castiel said, blatantly ignoring the fact that their chairs were so close to each other the backrests were grazing, Meg had a leg over his lap and his hand had been on her knee for the past fifteen minutes. Sam decided it was time to stop beating around the bush.

“We’re saying maybe it’s time you two get separate rooms.”

The little monsters stared at him for several minutes, and then Meg snickered.

“Nice one.”

“It’s not a joke, Meg,” Sam said. “We’re concerned you’re going to… well, you know adolescences are not the best at impulse control and…”

“Oh, my God, stop!” Meg said, making a horrified grimace. “We’re not _actually_ teenagers!”

“And we’ve been sharing a room for as long as we’ve been living here,” Castiel said. He actually looked incredibly stressed out at the idea of being separated from Meg. “Why would you want to change that now?”

Dean hit his forehead against the table. This was going to be a lot harder than he imagined.

“We’re concerned you’re going to have sex, okay?” Sam said bluntly. “A pregnant teen demon is the last thing we need right now.”

Dean raised his head again. Well, that had been easy. Expect because Meg was cringing, so offended that he thought she was going to start screaming at them again, and Castiel was tilting his head and blinking several times. After a few seconds, Meg shook her head.

“I knew you were trying to give us ‘the talk’,” she concluded.

“Why would we do that?” Castiel asked. He seemed utterly confused. “I know we’ve established that Meg is my girlfriend, but that has never been on our priorities.”

“Speak for yourself,” Meg snorted. “You know how long I’ve been waiting to have boobs again?”

“Okay, no,” Dean said, shuddering and trying to shake off the mental image. “No, no. That is not happening. Not under my roof. Not ever. Period.”

“What if we take the car somewhere else?” Meg suggested. “That way we won’t be technically under your roof…”

“No!” Dean shouted, horrified.

“What if we are very, very careful?”

“Meg, for the love of…” Sam started, before realizing the demon was smirking and messing with them.

“What if we just promise not to do it?” Castiel said, way too serious by contrast. “That way would you let us stay in the same room?”

“No!” the Winchesters screamed in unison.

“Why?” Castiel insisted, his blue eyes looking bigger as he begged the Winchesters. “You don’t trust we’ll keep our word?”

“I trust you, Cas, I just don’t trust your hormones,” Dean said, matter-of-factly. “You, I don’t trust at all,” he added, pointing at Meg.

“Oh, come on, that’s racist,” she complained. “Just because I’m a demon…”

“You weren’t making a very good case for yourself five seconds ago,” Sam commented.

“I was just joking!” Meg huffed. “Guys, come on, it’s still going to be a couple of years until we stop being a disgusting fabric of pimples anyway…”

“And by then it will be too late,” Sam shrugged.

“Sorry, guys,” Dean said. “Get used to the idea, because this is happening now before the school year begins.”

“Why?”

“Because then we’re gonna have to deal with your high school drama,” Dean stated. “And since we’re on topic, we’re going to establish some rules for that right _now_.”

The next two hours were Dean numbering the sort of things they were and were not allowed to do or say, which included not tormenting substitute teachers, _Meg_ , not starting food wars during lunch, _Meg_ , in fact, not any sort of prank at all, _Meg_. No, they couldn’t heal anybody even if they were badly hurt, _Cas_ , and no, that was no way of dealing with bullies.

“We know all these things already!” Meg complained.

“It never hurts a reminder,” Dean commented. “Teenagers are not going to be as easily fooled as your former classmates, you know?”

“Yes, they will,” Meg said. “They’re going to be so caught in their little worlds that they won’t be bothered to notice if Castiel suddenly started polishing his halo in the middle of a class.”

“That’s not how halos work…” Castiel tried to say.

“And have you ever met an actual teenager?” Sam asked. “They’re the most judging, horrible persons in the world. They will not let it pass by if you do anything that singles you out.”

“So? I’ll just smite them then,” Meg shrugged.

Dean sighed, tiredly.

“Okay,” he said. “From the beginning…”

It was a very long conversation, but finally, they let the little monsters get up after having them promise (multiple times and on multiple gods) that they would behave responsibly once classes started.

“Right,” Dean sighed. “So I guess now we throw a coin to see who moves out.”

“Again with that?” Meg rolled her eyes. “I don’t think so. Let’s go, Clarence.”

“Meg, it’s happening,” Dean warned them as they both left the kitchen. “You can’t avoid it by walking out on us. You’re going to have to accept it.”

“Really?” Meg asked, throwing him a smirk and a condescending look from the door. “And what exactly are you going to do if we don’t?”

Castiel shrugged, as if to say there wasn’t really much the Winchesters could do, grabbed Meg’s hand and they both disappeared.

“They sort of have a point,” Sam pointed out, once they were out the little monsters’ ear reach. “What can we do?”

“Are you giving up?” Dean asked, frowning at his brother. “Do I have to remind you this whole issue was your idea?”

“No, but… it’s not like we can stick them inside a Devil Trap and a circle of holy fire while we move their stuff,” Sam said. “Can we?”

Dean stroked his chin.

“I think you might be onto something, little brother.”

 

* * *

 

Mrs. Periwinkle was tending to a bush of flowers that were, well, periwinkle blue when Meg and Castiel stopped at her gate _. Pericles_ , who was resting in his cat form on the window’s ledge, jumped down and trotted towards them to rub against Meg’s leg.

“Good morning, Mrs. Periwinkle,” Castiel greeted the old witch.

“Oh, hello, little dears!” Mrs. Periwinkle smiled at them. “How are you?”

“We’re good,” Meg replied, as she extended her arms for Pericles to jump towards them. “Sam and Dean asked us to check on you. It was probably a ploy to get us out of the bunker for some reason.”

“Do you need any help with the house?” Castiel asked.

“No, I don’t think I do, dearie,” answered the witch, putting aside her gardening scissors. “But I do have an apple pie in the oven that’s going to be ready soon. Care to join me for tea?”

She didn’t even need to ask.

In the four years since they had first set foot in Mrs. Periwinkle’s house, the place had changed a lot. Instead of the eerie, dead garden it once had in front, now it there was a luscious green grass all over. The once dead twisted tree had bloomed again (magically, they suspected), and now the biggest, reddest apples hung from its branches. Most of them ended up in Mrs. Periwinkle’s pie, which she always had prepared in case the Winchesters or the kids went to visit her. The broken windows, the missing tiles from the roof, everything had been properly fixed to the point where the initial creepiness had been replaced by coziness.

The neighbors, who were convinced the house had been abandoned the entire time, were happy to see what the kind old lady that “now” lived there had done with it, but the Meg and Castiel knew better. They suspected the house’s aspect had a lot to do with Mrs. Periwinkle’s mood, so now that she was happy people were visiting her again, she made extra sure that everything was presentable, and to always have something in the oven that was ready (again, magically) whenever someone came around. She paid the neighbor’s kid to rake her leaves or to shovel the snow on her sidewalk, even though she was perfectly capable of doing that herself. Of course, it was just an excuse to invite them in for tea.

“Please, be patient with me,” said Mrs. Periwinkle as she looked around for a knife to cut the pie. “I’m four hundred and twelve years old, I’m not as agile as I used to.”

 _Pericles_ immediately adopted his human form and helped her mistress serve everything, before turning into a cat again to resume his nap on Meg’s lap.

“He’s so lazy these summer days,” commented the witch, as she poured the tea on the kid’s cups. “I keep telling him he should go out and play with the other pets. He keeps reminding me he’s not exactly a pet.”

“Well, he’s not, is he?” Meg commented, scratching the familiar behind the ears.

“That gives him no excuse to be so antisocial,” Mrs. Periwinkle replied, putting the plates with pie in front of them. “Now, you two are growing so tall! Soon you’re going to be bigger than me.”

Not that Mrs. Periwinkle’s height was a mark particularly difficult to pass. Meg was tempted to say that, but the witch’s pie was so good she didn’t even feel the need to be mean while eating it.

“Are you going to start school again?”

“Yeah, but it’s a waste of time,” Meg replied. “We already know everything there’s to know about… well, everything.”

“You try telling me that once math classes starts,” Mrs. Periwinkle chuckled.

Meg looked at her with horror in her face and was about to ask who had said anything about _math_ , when Castiel cleared his throat.

“Can I have more pie?” he asked, presenting a plate that had taking him all two minutes to empty.

“Oh, goodness,” Mrs. Periwinkle said, obviously a little taken aback. “Yes, of course. Maybe I should prepare some more now so you can take home with you.”

“Don’t bother,” Meg said with a giggle. “He’s going to eat it all on the way.”

“I… will not,” Castiel protested, blushing furiously.

Of course, by the time they returned to the bunker, there was only a piece of pie left and Castiel was using all his willpower to avoid eating it.

“I should save it for Dean,” he said, staring at it with wolf-life hunger in his tearful blue eyes. “Dean hasn’t had the possibility to visit Mrs. Periwinkle, so he hasn’t tried her pie and he loves her pie and I should…”

“Just eat it,” Meg encouraged him with an eye roll as they pushed the bunker’s door open and descended the stairs. “It’s not like he’ll know.”

“I will know,” Castiel protested.

Meg opened her mouth to start a heated debate on the moral relativism that would allow Castiel to soothe his guilty conscience when they saw Sam crossing the hallway with something in his hands. At first Meg couldn’t quite say what it was, but as they took one step forwards she realized: it was her entire collection of magazines, the one she had been investing whatever money she could beg, steal and borrow from the Winchesters, and that had been carefully ordered by chronological and alphabetical order.

“What are you doing?!” she shouted horrified, but it wasn’t hard to guess when Sam stopped in his tracks and looked at her with a mix of guilt and fear in his expression.

“I’m sorry, Meg,” he said, and in his defense, he did genuinely looked like it. “We told you this was happening.”

Meg out let out a single, horrified, hellish shout and lunged herself towards Sam… only to get stuck right in the middle of the library. When she looked up, she found a Devil’s Trap drawn on the ceiling above her. Which only make her howl even louder and angrier than before.

“Who the hell gave you permission to touch my things?!” she bellowed. “Put them back in my room, I ain’t moving anywhere!”

“It’s not your room,” Dean intervened, appearing on the hallway behind his brother. “It’s Castiel’s room, and you’ll have your own room from now on. Drop the overemotional teenage girl act, Meg. It doesn’t suit you.”

Meg still screamed a string of obscenities and curses at them that would have made Lucifer uncomfortable (and Sam would know), but Dean stayed firm.

“You ain’t coming out of the Trap until you decide to act maturely,” he determined. “So let us know when you’re ready to do that.”

Meg sat down with her arms over her chest, throwing the sulkiest glare in Dean’s direction as he passed her by.

“Heya, Cas,” he greeted the angel. “Is that Mrs. Perwiwinkle’s pie?”

Castiel looked down at the container in his hands like he had forgotten he had it.

“Yes,” he said, removing the lid. “And there’s only one piece left.”

And without breaking eye contact with Dean, he stuffed it whole into his mouth.


	3. Unknown

Meg couldn’t sleep.

She had been tossing and turning in her bed for about two hours, pausing now and then to stare at the ceiling or to scratch _Mephistopheles_ ears in the hopes the cat’s purring would relax her. It had been a week since she and Castiel were forced into separate rooms by the Winstalins, as she had taken to call them when she had to talk to them out of strict necessity.

The change wasn’t sitting well with her. First, Sam might have tried to keep her things in order while moving them, but he had done such a crappy job at it that she had to spend the better part of two days rearranging them in a way that she could find acceptable. Second, she hadn’t slept a wink in all that time.

“Is the bed too uncomfortable?” Sam had asked when she brought them her complaints. “Is it the sheets? Maybe we can change them…”

“The bed is just fine,” Dean had cut him off. “She’s just being fussy to annoy us.”

Meg had scowled at him, crossed her arms over her chest and refused to say another word during the rest of the day.

“Exactly how long do you think you can maintain this silent treatment?” Dean had asked her, obviously exasperated but refusing to cave in to Meg’s silent demands. She had looked away without answering. “Okay, fine,” Dean huffed. “Have it your way.”

Meg knew her indifference wasn’t going to make much of a difference for the older Winchester, but Sam was going out of his mind with it.

“Maybe you could try counting sheep or having a glass of warm milk before going to sleep,” he’d suggested, repeatedly. “It’s not good for your health that you can’t sleep, Meg. Really. Just tell us what we can do to help.”

“Perhaps there’s absolutely nothing that you can do to help,” Castiel had intervened. “Perhaps it has something to with our growing selves. As we recover our powers, maybe the human necessities that have been inflicted upon us will start disappearing.”

“Why?” Dean had asked, rising his eyes towards Castiel. “Do you have trouble sleeping too?”

“Not that it would be of any of your interest,” Castiel had said, shooting Dean the most irritated glance in the history of angelkind. “As my well-being and personal wishes are clearly of very little importance to you.”

“Are you sassing me?” Dean had said, incredulous, as he obviously didn’t expect Cas to turn against him. Castiel simply kept eating his dinner with all the dignity that one could expect from a heavenly warrior. “How can you say that? Of course I care! Why would you even…? Cas, come on!”

Meg had hid her smirk behind her glass of water and squeezed Cas’ hand underneath the tablecloth. It was nice to know that he was fully on her side on this issue.

But as sweet as her petty revenge was, it still didn’t help Meg sleep.

The problem was the bed, as Sam had pointed out. It was too big, and too cold, and there weren’t nearly enough pillows…

She stopped with a huff. The bed was just fine.

“This is ridiculous,” she decided. _Mephistopheles_ raised his head when she got up and tiptoed towards the door.

Meg opened it, and stayed in the hallway for a very long time, listening closely. She could hear Sam and Dean’s breathing coming from their respective rooms, deep and rhythmical, indicating they were fast asleep. Ever since the hunters had decided to stay in the bunker on more permanent basis to “raise” them, their sleeping patterns had become a lot more normal. Yet, they still had very sensitive years, so Meg picked up her cat so not even the scratching of his paws would disturb the bunker’s peace.

She was just reaching the end of the hall when she heard a step and she froze, her mind already preparing a dozen mildly credible answers to one of the brothers asking why she was out of bed (including the not-so-subtle “None of your fucking business”), but it was none of the Winchester who came around the corner.

Castiel stopped dead in his tracks when he saw her. His hair was in complete disarray, like he had been turning around in his bed too, without falling asleep. He was carrying Mr. Whiskers in his arms and blinking sleepily in the dim light.

“Oh,” he muttered. “I was just…”

“Yeah,” she cut him off. “Me too.”

They stared at each other for another moment and then Meg cracked a smirk and Castiel looked at his bare feet, slightly self-conscious.

“Sam and Dean are going to be mad if they catch us,” he commented.

“Well, then, let’s make sure they don’t,” Meg shrugged.

Castiel hesitated for another second, but as it was usually the case in those situations, Meg ended up getting away with hers.

Meg settled nicely against the pillow because it was _her_ pillow, in _her_ bed with _her_ angel resting just two inches away from her. Finally, after seven torturous days of sleeping only for hours at a time, she was ready for her first night of actual rest in a while.

“Meg,” Castiel called in the darkness. His voice was still soft and gentle, but in moments like that, it seemed like it was starting to recover the roughness that it used to have before the spell.

Meg sighed, knowing fully well that Castiel wouldn’t shut up until he had got whatever it was out of his chest.

“Yes, Clarence?”

“What do you think the new school’s going to be like?”

“Don’t know, don’t care,” Meg said, pulling the covers over her head a little more to indicate she wasn’t up for any more conversation. “Good night.”

“Oh, okay,” Castiel whispered. “Good night.”

The silence lasted for about two minutes before Castiel came up with another question.

“Meg,” he called again. “Do you think Peggy will be there?”

“She said she would,” Meg muttered, refusing to open her eyes.

“How do you know?”

“Because I used this magical invention called a cellphone to keep in touch with her,” Meg groaned. “Sam and Dean gave you one too, remember?”

“Yes,” he said. “You promised to show me how to use the camera but you never did.”

“Okay, well, we’ll do that tomorrow.”

“Promise?”

“Go to sleep, Cas.”

There was silence for a couple of seconds and Meg had just begun to relax when…

“Meg…”

“Oh, my God!” Meg grabbed a pillow and threw directly in the angel’s general direction. “What now?!”

“I was just wondering if you were going to sleep here every night,” he asked, not fazed at all by Meg’s violent reaction.

“I don’t know,” she sighed. “They could get suspicious.”

“Yeah,” Castiel agreed. “Maybe we could take turns. I could go to your room some nights, and you could come here on others.”

“Sounds good,” Meg said.

Castiel shifted a little in the mattress and Meg thought she would have to scream at him for stealing the covers, but he simply was getting closer to return Meg’s pillow. However, when she finished settling again, a warm hand came to rest on top of hers, effectively silencing all the rampaging thoughts in her mind. Automatically, she intertwined her fingers with Castiel’s, trying to ignore the strange tingle in her hand and how her heart was suddenly beating just a little bit faster now.

“Good night, Meg,” Castiel said, and she swore she could hear the smile on his face.

At least that got him to calm down. Meg stayed very still, looking at the ceiling and wondering for the first time if the Winchester might have been right about this whole thing after all. She had flirted with the angel before, when they were in their adult bodies, and of course, she knew perfectly well he had a kid’s crush on her, so this was nothing new.

The little electric current she felt when their skins had come into contact, however… that was definitely different. That was something unknown that she…

“Cas?” she whispered, because she needed to get distracted. “Are you asleep?”

The answer came only after a few seconds.

“Not really,” he sighed, although he was lying and she could tell he was lying. “What do you need, Meg?”

“Will you tell me again about how the stars are born?”

Cas moved closer still, disturbing the cats in doing so, just so he could speak against Meg’s hair.

“First an old star crumbles,” he started. “And the millions of little particles of dust are left floating adrift in the vastness of the universe…”

 

* * *

 

“You’re awfully cheery,” Dean commented that Monday morning while Meg slurped what was left of her milk from her bowl.

“It’s a pretty morning, we’re starting a new school year full of potential victims,” Meg replied, with a satisfied smile in her face and a little shrug. “What there’s not to be happy about?”

Dean narrowed his eyes at her, but after a moment, he decided it couldn’t be such a bad thing that Meg was talking to him again. Of course, after all those years, he should have known better.

Sam and Castiel walked into the kitchen to find them having a very intense stare contest. Meg was smirking with immense satisfaction, while Dean just seemed completely stoic and calm, except for the little twitch in his eye. Sam just went straight for the coffee pot without asking any question.

“Good morning, Clarence,” Meg said, not looking away from Dean.

“We already…” Castiel began saying, and cringed in pain when he received a swift kick in the shins. “I mean… good morning to you too,” he corrected himself. “What are you and Dean doing?”

“Nothing,” Meg answered. “I’m just waiting for Dean here to finish his coffee so he can take us to school on our very first day. You know, like he does.”

On second thought, maybe having coffee that particular morning wasn’t such a good idea. Sam discreetly poured the content of his cup down the sink and grabbed a bowl to get himself some cereals. Castiel was finishing his, while alternatively looking at both Meg and Dean, clearly still trying to figure what was going on.

“Uh, guys,” Sam said. “I don’t mean to interrupt… whatever is going here. But we’re going to be late if you don’t, you know, cut it out soon.”

Dean let out a long, tired sigh.

“Will this somehow satisfy your burning desire for revenge?”

“Very much so,” Meg said, her malicious smirk blooming into a full blown shit-eating grin.

Dean wrapped his hands around the cup, picked it up and took it to his lips. Sam watched him very closely, waiting for him to start choking or screaming in pain, but the older Winchester simply gulped down the dark liquid that Sam was fully convinced at this point wasn’t coffee. Dean didn’t even flinch, though. He just finished it up and put the cup back down.

“Are we even?” he asked, in a voice slightly rougher than usual.

“For now,” Meg accepted.

“Good,” Dean cleared his throat. “Go get ready and wait by the car you two.”

The moment the little monsters were out of the kitchen, Dean succumbed to the driest, ugliest sounding coughing fit. He hit his chest with a fist as he grabbed onto the side of the table not to fall down, with tears streaming down his cheek.

“Oh, my God!” Sam ran to get him a napkin. “What did she _do_?”

“Salt,” Dean explained between huffs and puffs. “She put… she put salt into my coffee.”

“That’s so petty,” Sam commented. “I mean, even for her, that’s…”

“Yeah,” Dean murmured. “She better not find out it was your idea to put them into separate rooms.”

Sam decided that, if it was up to him, that was a secret he would take into his burning grave.

 

* * *

 

There were children running around the school grounds, throwing footballs and laughing. Some were gathering up with their groups of fiends talking too loudly about their summers (or maybe it was that Meg’s hearing was becoming more acute. Whatever the case, she found them annoying). Most were dressed in bright colors, but Meg spotted a small group dressed all in black and hurling underneath the shadow of a big tree. Some were wearing Satanist symbols on their shirts or around their necks, which made her roll her eyes real hard.

“Amateurs,” she muttered under her breath.

“So, don’t forget to go pick up your schedules,” Sam said, obviously a little bit nervous (Dean was left sulking in the Impala. Meg reckoned it would be a while since he forgave her for the coffee stunt). “And try to introduce yourselves to your classmates, but… you know. And…”

“Sam,” Castiel cut him off. “I have faced hordes of demons in the darkest parts of hell. I think I can survive this.”

“Don’t be so sure, Clarence,” Meg snickered. “These are worse. They are _teenagers_.”

Despite her statement, she grabbed Castiel’s hand and waved at Sam.

“Don’t come pick us up afterwards,” Meg said as she started to walk away. “It’ll be embarrassing.”

“Okay, yeah,” Sam muttered, obviously taken aback by Meg’s confidence. “You, uh… you have fun!”

“Are they still there?” Meg asked as they reached the school’s door.

Castiel looked over his shoulders. “Yes,” he sighed. “I reckon that, despite your warning, they’ll be there the entire day.”

“Hello, guys.”

“Hello, Peggy,” they greeted in unison.

“I like your braces,” Castiel said.

Peggy looked down, obviously well aware that Castiel was just saying that to make her feel good. The dentist had insisted on giving her one of those horrible and super uncomfortable ones that made her face all rigid and forced her into an involuntary smile all the time. In those four years, Peggy hadn’t grown very much, and now even Meg was taller than her. With her elongated face and her flat chest, she looked positively childish despite her fourteen years old. The fact she still wore pigtails and glasses didn’t help.

A group of juniors took one look at her and decided that she would be the perfect target for mockery.

“Hey, look at the wired stick!” one of them shouted, pointing a finger at Peggy. “I bet if we put a radio next to her, we could receive signals from outer space.”

The group of friends around him howled with laughter. Peggy’s cheeks turned bright red and she blinked a couple of times to remove the tears from her eyes. Both Meg and Castiel immediately turned towards the bullies.

“That was a stupid thing to say,” Castiel began, in the calmest tone. “Outer space, as far as I am aware, is devoid of all forms of life, except for the most primal ones. It would take millions of years for them to evolve into a sufficiently advanced race to communicate with us through radio waves. But even if it were somehow possible, it is very rude of you to assume Peggy is an inanimate object such as a radio antenna.”

The bully’s face froze, partly because he didn’t expect the freshmen to talk back, and partly, Meg suspected, because he hadn’t understood a word Castiel had said.

“Well… looks like we have a fresh batch of nerds, guys,” the bully said. His friends laughed again, but not as enthusiastically as before.

“Please,” Meg huffed. “Is that best you can do? I’ve seen more fighting spirit in the bottom of the bottle your dad crawls into every night.”

All the color fled from the bully’s face, while all his friends gasped audibly. Apparently, Meg had perfectly delivered a low blow, and she smiled, unrepentant.

“Don’t talk about my dad!” he shouted.

“Oh, not so smart now, huh, Jeremy Smith?” Meg asked, crooking an eyebrow. “You enjoy inflicting your petty brand of sadism unto others, but I bet you wouldn’t know true suffering and horror if it slapped you in the face.” She blinked, very slowly, so Jeremy could appreciate the change in her eyes. “Would you like to try your hand at it?”

There were a few seconds of tense silence. Then Jeremy turn on his heels and fled, followed closely by his flock of terrified bullies. Peggy sighed deeply.

“Thank you,” she said. “I still don’t know how you do that thing with your eyes, but it sure scares the hell out of everyone.”

“You could scare the hell out of everyone too if you tried,” Meg commented.

“But I’m not smart and confident like you are,” Peggy said, still staring at her shoes.

“You _are_ very smart, Peggy,” Castiel said. “You just need to work on the confidence part.”

Peggy raised her eyes. “You really think so?”

“Totally,” Meg replied, lassoing one arm around Peggy’s. “Chin up, Watkins. We’re going to rule this place.”

And the three stalked into the unknown territory that was high school.


	4. Reverse

Based on the rhythm of how it’d happened on previous years, the Winchesters calculated it’d take Meg exactly thirteen days, two hours and six minutes to decide that high school was stupid and boring and she would rather be getting into some trouble to make it more interesting. Luckily, that gave them enough time to come up with a contingency plan, entirely aware that it was just a matter of time before the school called informing them Meg had blown up the gym or something of the sorts.

That’s why it was weird that Dean couldn’t hide his surprise when the call finally came.

“Say that again?” he asked, frowning. “He did what?”

Sam lifted his eyes from the book he was reading to stare at his brother.

“I see,” Dean said, though by the way he was frowning, it was hard that he could see anything at all. “And then? Oh. Yeah. Right, of course. We will be there. Thank you.”

He hung up and spent a few seconds staring into the distance, as if to finish understanding what he’d just heard.

“Cas got detention,” he announced.

“What?” Sam asked. He was half-prepared to have his brother say that he had misheard him or that he was kidding him, but Dean’s face was completely serious, albeit clearly confused.

“He got detention,” he repeated. “On the second week of school.”

“Okay,” Sam said, still waiting for a punch line in all that business. “Why? What did he do?”

“He sassed the history teacher,” Dean explained.

The brothers stared at each other, utterly astonished.

“And what are we supposed to do now?” Sam asked. He was asking in general, because this totally put their expectations upside down.

“I guess we have to go to the school now,” Dean said. “Talk to the principal or something.”

“Okay, yeah,” Sam said. “Let’s do that.”

They remained rooted to their spot for several minutes still.

 

* * *

 

Meg was sitting in the entrance steps, with all her attention so focused on a cellphone she had the tip of her tongue appearing between her lips. Peggy and two other girls were sitting around her, rooting for her and giving her tips like: “No, you should use the other one” or “Don’t throw it with so much force!”

It wasn’t until Sam shadow was practically over her that she raised her head.

“Oh, hey, losers,” she greeted them. “Cas is inside.”

“What are you doing?” Sam asked.

“Angry Birds,” Meg replied, with a little frown between her eyebrows. “It’s more complicated than it looks.”

“You just have to point this there,” Peggy indicated, and in a display that would have get any other person killed or at least got their fingers chopped, she took the cellphone from Meg’s hand and showed her how to do it. “See? If you do it like that…”

“Wow, you’re so good at this,” said the black girl with Senegalese twists sitting behind Meg.

“Do you play Candy Crush too?” asked the other girl, who had blonde hair in a pixie cut and several piercings in her ear.

“I could give it a try.”

“Yes, send me some lives…”

Dean and Sam exchanged looks, still not quite sure what was going on there. Meg was actually interacting with human beings that weren’t them or Peggy, and there was no one getting threatened or dismembered for it. Had the world gone insane? Had another apocalypse happened while they weren’t looking?

They left Meg and her group of gaming girls and walked towards the principal’s office, all the time looking for signs that they weren’t in some kind of weird dream world. Principal Gonzalez was a chubby woman who throw them a very severe look from behind her rim horned glasses when they announced they were Castiel Novak’s uncles.

“Yes, Mr. Paige and… Mr. Paige,” the principal said, beckoning them to sit in front of her desk. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you for a while now. I’m not in the use to talk to parents or guardians directly, especially this early in the school year. To be quite honest with you, I’m very worried about your nephew.”

“Sure, yeah, I get that,” Dean put a palm up as if to stop the principal from saying another word. “But are you sure you’re getting this right? We’re here to talk about _Castiel_? Is that correct?”

Principal Gonzalez arched an eyebrow, probably thinking the brothers were fooling around, but very pointedly looked down at the file in front of her and then back up at them.

“Yes, Castiel,” she said. “That _is_ your nephew’s name, isn’t it?”

“Yes, that’s right,” Sam said. “I’m sorry, we’re confused. Castiel is such an agreeable boy; we’ve never had any trouble with him. In fact, whenever we’re in a principal’s office these days, it’s usually to talk about Meg.”

“Oh, no, no,” Principal Gonzalez shook her head. “The elementary school’s principal had the kindness of sending me a warning about her, but I must say I don’t see the reason for it. Meg is fitting in very well here. In only two weeks, she’s already made a lot of friends. She doesn’t seem to be very interested in the academic aspects of school, but she’s keeping up, and in the meantime, she’s very sociable with all her schoolmates.”

Dean blinked very slowly.

“I’m sorry, are we talking about the same Meg?”

“You seem to be a bit unclear as to who your nephews are, Mr. Paige,” said Principal Gonzalez. “Meg is the girl, and she’s doing fine. Castiel is the boy, and he… well, not so much.”

She went on to describe a series of problematic behaviors Castiel had been caught doing: he got distracted in class constantly, and when asked about it, he said he was utterly uninterested in the imprecise and factually mistaken information he was being given.

“He does… spend a lot of time doing his own investigations,” Sam excused him.

He’d also proclaimed loudly that Couch Appleby was nothing but a sadistic bully and refused to follow his instructions during PE. When he was forced to play dodge ball, he stood on the field and blatantly let the opposing team hit him with the ball on the first round.

“Well, he’s never been very competitive,” Dean said. “He was probably trying to give the other kids some sort of advantage. Or take the higher ground or… something.”

And finally, the incident that had ended with Castiel on detention that very day: during History Class, he had started arguing with the teacher about certain ancient historical events. The conversation had got heated enough that Castiel had ended standing on his desk and shouting: “No, you are wrong! You weren’t there, but _I_ was and I’m telling you _are_ wrong!”

Sam and Dean couldn’t come up with an explanation for that.

Principal Gonzalez looked at them with something akin to pity.

“Look, I think I know what’s going on,” she said. “I’ve been dealing with teenagers for a long time. A very long, long time,” she added, with the gaze of a veteran who talked about the bloody battles they’d witnessed. “Children change, sometimes without the parents realizing it. It happens. If I had a dollar for every parent that had come into this office to swear up and down that their little girl or their little boy could never do something like that… I could apply for early retirement.”

“Yeah, and you probably earned it, too,” Dean said with a smile meant to lighten up the conversation. Principal Gonzalez just glared at him. “I mean, this job is probably super stressing, but you seem to be dealing with it quite well. I don’t mean to say that you look anything but stunning. Not that I think that you’re stunning since that’d be inappropriate because you’re a married woman and…”

Sam put a hand on his brother’s forearm and Dean immediately interrupted his rambling and looked down in shame.

“What I’m trying to say,” Principal Gonzalez continued like the last thirty seconds had not passed at all. “It’s that your little ones are growing up, becoming new people, finding out things about themselves and the world. And it’s natural that sometimes they start acting out.”

“Yes, we get that,” Sam said. “But you don’t understand. Cas and Meg are… special.”

“Yes, Mr. Paige, all parents think they’re children are special,” Principal Gonzalez smiled, condescendingly.

“No, he means they’re extra special,” Dean tried to say.

“Yes, I am aware of the losses they had endured,” Principal Gonzalez nodded. “It’s a shame that they had to go through all that at such a young age. But as I told you, I do believe Meg is adapting perfectly. But you might need to sit down and have a talk with Castiel.”

Afterwards, the Winchesters found themselves outside the office, still not entirely sure of what had happened.

“What do you think _is_ his problem?” Dean asked.

“I don’t know,” Sam replied. “I guess we’ll have to find out.”

Castiel was the only kid sitting in the detention classroom. He was quietly but steadily carving a hole in his desk while the distracted teacher that was supposed to be looking for him snored quietly over a book. Dean opened the door and beckoned Castiel to get away, the angel pushed the desk aside, making a high screeching noise as it slid on the floor and stomped towards the door. The teacher didn’t even open his eyes, which made Dean suspect his sleep might not have been entirely natural.

“You okay, buddy?”

“Fine,” Castiel answered, laconic. “What took you so long to come and get me?”

“Well, you see…” Sam started.

But Castiel was already walking away without waiting for an answer, his backpack swaying to the sides as he practically fled from the brothers. Meg was still outside with her group of girls when Castiel passed them by running.

“Sorry, girls, gotta go,” she said, standing up and running after him. “Hey, Cas! Hey, wait!”

Castiel didn’t stop until he was next to the Impala. He tried to open the door, but when he realized the car was locked, he let out a big huff.

“Hey, what is up with you?” Meg asked, frowning in the angel’s direction.

“Nothing,” Castiel grumbled, still pulling the handle in a futile attempt to escape that conversation.

“Woah, dude, stop, stop,” Dean said, as he ran towards him. “You’re going to rip it open. Stop.”

“Well, then, just open it!” Castiel snapped. The light bulb in the lamppost behind him sparkled and exploded with a shattering of glass.

Both the Winchesters and Meg stared at him buggy-eyed. Very slowly, Dean took out the keys from inside his jacket and unlocked the door for Castiel.

“Thank you,” the angel muttered before sliding inside. He put his feet up on the seat so he could hug his knees and basically stayed silent and sulky the whole way back to the bunker.

 

* * *

 

“So we have pasta for dinner,” Sam tried to say. “You like pasta, don’t you, Cas?”

“Not hungry,” Castiel growled as he passed by the couch. He stopped to pick up his cat and promptly disappeared on the hallway.

“Okay, what is wrong with him?” Dean asked, and immediately turned to Meg. “Do you have any idea?”

“Do I look like Dr. Phil to you?” she asked, rolling her eyes.

Despite everything, Dean was glad they could still count on Meg being snarky and unnecessarily mean.

“I thought you guys were thick as thieves,” Dean pointed out.

“Well, he doesn’t tell me _everything_ ,” Meg said. “And besides, he hasn’t talked to me that much this week.”

She sat down on the nearest chair and grabbed Sam’s laptop.

“Why not?” Sam asked, not even fazed at the fact knew his password despite having it changed two days ago.

“I don’t think he likes my new friends,” Meg replied, as she opened a chat group to talk to said friends.

“Yeah, speaking of that,” Dean said. “How do you even _have_ friends? What could you possibly have in common with these girls? Peggy I get, because she basically worships you, but the others?”

“I believe it has something to do with me instilling fear in the hearts of everyone who so much dares to look at me wrong,” Meg shrugged, but she couldn’t help the proud smirk that appeared on her lips. “Teenage girls are attracted to that and will choose the scariest of them as their leader.”

When both Winchesters stared at her in astonishment, she shrugged and added:

“I watched _Mean Girls_.”

She continued to happily type away while the brothers communicated silently through their eyebrows.

“I’ll make dinner,” Sam decided.

“I’ll go see if Cas’ done brooding,” Dean offered.

“Dean,” Meg called. She didn’t take her eyes off the screen as she spoke: “Can you ask him if he’s mad at me?”

“Do I look like a messenger pigeon to you?”

“Oh, my God,” Meg threw her arms in the air, clearly not amused. “Just ask him, will you?”

Dean didn’t make any promises.

Castiel was lying on his side on the bed, so immobile Dean wouldn’t have guessed he was awake if it wasn’t for the purring of _Mr. Whiskers_.

“Hey, buddy, may I come in?” Dean asked.

There was no answer. He took a careful step inside, because he didn’t want to be pushed out by a sudden wave of angelic power, but Castiel stayed right where he was. So Dean took another step and another one until he reached the bed and sat by the little angel.

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

“No,” Castiel growled, grabbing his pillow and covering his head with it.

“Okay,” Dean replied. He toyed with his fingers for a little while, trying to come up with something to say. “You know, when I was in high school…” he began, before realizing that was a broad generalization because he had never been at just this one high school and he had never really done the whole graduating with a cap and a robe thingie. He cleared his throat and continued: “When I was your age…” he started and went quiet again, because despite it all, Castiel was still millions of years older than him. “Well, not exactly your age, but you know what I mean…”

“Dean,” Castiel cut him off. “Will you just get to the point?”

“So there was this girl called Amanda Heckling,” Dean continued, trying to ignore the rude tone on Castiel’s voice. “She was very pretty, and she was very into me. Thing is, I knew I would be skipping town two weeks from them, so I got a little reckless and…”

“Dean, seriously,” Cas insisted, turning over his shoulder to glance at the hunter. “I have no idea what are you trying to say.”

“I’m not entirely sure either,” Dean admitted. “I guess the point I wanna make is relationships are complicated, especially when you’re going through what you’re going through. There’s no need to get upset about those. Meg will still be your best friend… girlfriend. Whatever. No matter how many exciting people she meets.”

Castiel turned over completely and stared at Dean with a frown.

“I don’t mind Meg meeting new people,” he declared.

“You… don’t?” Dean asked, pretty sure he had reached his daily quota of confusion.

“No. It’s good for her social skills,” Castiel shrugged. “It may lead her to appreciate human life in all its forms a little bit more.”

“Yeah, and that can only be a good thing,” Dean agreed. “But then, why are you acting so emo?”

Castiel hugged his knees to his chest again.

“I just would like her to include me more,” he admitted, staring at his shoes (Dean didn’t even think about scolding him for using shoes on the bed). “People at school think I’m weird, so I don’t have as many friends as her. So sometimes when she’s talking to her friends… it gets lonely.”

That was a little too chick-flicky for Dean’s taste, but he understood where Cas coming from.

“Well, I think you should tell her that,” he said. “She’s worried you might be mad at her.”

“Really?” Cas’ blue eyes widened. They didn’t look as enormous as they used to now that his face had caught up, but they were still disturbingly big. “She said that?”

“Not with so many words, but you know her,” Dean said. “And maybe it would help if you stopped trying to convince teachers you were there to witness Ancient History events.”

“But their information is so wrong!” the little angel protested.

Dean just stared at him until Castiel realized how that wasn’t helping his case.

“Fine,” Castiel sighed. “Maybe I’ll just try and get hobby to zone out in classes. Like Meg does with her cellphone games.”

“You try that,” Dean approved, and put a hand on his shoulder. “You fine now?”

“Yeah,” Castiel smiled.

Dean extended his arms and waited.

“What are you doing?” Castiel asked, tilting his head.

“Well, you always used to give me a hug when you were littler in moments like these,” Dean reminded him. Castiel kept staring at him like he had no idea what he was talking about. “I thought that maybe… no? Okay, then. Dinner’s probably ready.”

Castiel got off the bed and stretched his abnormally large arms (sweet Jesus, the kid was all limbs). Dean stood up to do the same, still trying to process the era of spontaneous hugs was over. Castiel stopped by the door and looked over his shoulder.

“Thank you, Dean,” he said. “I’m glad we talked.”

And he left without another word.

“Hey,” Sam said when Dean entered the kitchen to help him with the plates. “Did you talk to him?”

“Yeah,” Dean smirked. “I think he’s going to be just fine.”


	5. Mystery

Slowly but surely, the warmer days became rarer during the following months, until it was time to rake the leaves from the bunker’s entry again. At some point during November, _Mr. Whiskers_ and _Mephistopheles_ started to run around the house in brand new little sweaters. _Mephistopheles_ had a new one every time Sam saw him, and Dean kept complaining about finding traces of clawed out wool underneath the couch or the kids’ beds.

“Meg, you shouldn’t let your cat destroy his sweaters,” Sam scolded the little demon once.

“Why?” Meg asked, without even raising her eyes from the magazine she was reading. She had her feet on the couch, and it was a good thing Dean wasn’t there to see her, because it had been raining all day and she had dragged mud in everywhere. “I can’t make him stop hating them.”

“Yes, maybe, but Mrs. Periwinkle keeps knitting them and it’s rude that you make her do a new one every time the cat decides to act like the fashion police.”

Meg looked at him with a crooked eyebrow… and then burst out laughing like Sam had just told her the best joke in the world.

“What?” Sam asked, confused.

“You think is Mrs. Periwinkle knitting them?”

“Then who is it?” Sam asked, but Meg was practically rolling on her stomach again, so much that tears began streaming down her face. “Meg, who’s knitting the sweaters?”

But Meg simply laughed for ten minutes straight until Sam threw his hands in the air and decided he didn’t care anyway. But as winter drew closer, the cats weren’t the only ones who showed up with sweaters: Meg started wearing some very pretty ones Sam was certain they hadn’t bought for her. Most of them were violet or purple (Meg’s favorite color), and she looked very pleased with herself every time she showed up with one, which led Sam to suspect she was the one knitting them.

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” he told her once. “I mean, if it’s something you like, there’s no reason you should be ashamed of your hobby.”

Meg laughed in his face again, harder and longer this time, and still refused to name the sweater’s knitter.

And then one morning, Dean showed up in the kitchen wearing a green one with a “D” in the middle over his pajamas. That convinced Sam Meg couldn’t be the one knitting them, because she would never do anything that nice for Dean.

“Where did you get that?” Sam asked, because the mystery of the sweaters had definitely begun to bother him.

“What, this?” Dean asked, tugging the edge of the sweater. “Pretty, isn’t it? And it’s really warm. We should send Mrs. Periwinkle a thank you note.”

“Why would you assumed is Mrs. Periwinkle who did it?” Sam asked. “Did she give it to you?”

“Well, no,” Dean admitted, as he absentmindedly busied himself with the pancakes. “It sort of showed up in my closet, and I figured that’s something a witch would do. Remember that year she gave us those horrible Christmas sweater? I had a picture of it somewhere. We should get it framed…”

“Dean, focus. This is important,” Sam groaned. “There’s no way Mrs. Periwinkle by-passed the bunker’s security measures and put a sweater in your closet.”

“Maybe she sent her cat with it,” Dean said. “Why do you care?”

“It could be dangerous,” Sam said. “If we don’t know who is making them, they could have all sort of sortileges…”

“Sam,” Dean interrupted him, putting a plate of pancakes in front of him. “Eat and stop worrying about it.”

“I won’t stop worrying about it!”

“Worry about what?” Meg asked, as she entered the kitchen with her backpack and a yawning Castiel. She was wearing a red cardigan Sam was certain she didn’t have the day before.

“Sam is mad because he hasn’t received a sweater,” Dean explained with a shrug.

“That is so not it!” Sam exclaimed, frustrated as Meg exploded in chuckles again. “I don’t care, okay? I think it’s weird that sweaters just started showing up for everybody…”

“Don’t worry, Sam,” Meg smiled in between bites of pancake. “I’m sure you’ll get a sweater before Christmas too.”

Castiel, who was quietly snoozing over his plate, woke up enough to agree with a curt nod.

Sure enough, not three days later a beige V neck cardigan appeared between Sam’s clothes. The hunter took it out, examined it closely to make sure it didn’t had any tags or traces of ripped tags, and then promptly put it in a bag and left the bunker for Mrs. Periwinkle’s house.

“Oh, Sam, it’s so good to see you!” the witch greeted him with a smile. “Come on in. Let me make a bit of tea…”

“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Sam tried to say, but the little old lady had already disappeared inside the house and was putting the kettle over the stove.

Sam had no more remedy than sitting down in the witch’s kitchen and make small talk for a while.

“How are the little ones?” she asked, as grabbed handfuls of herbs that hanged from the walls and started squashing them in a mortar. “Busy with school, I imagine.”

“Oh, yeah, definitely,” Sam said. “Meg is having some trouble with her math, though.”

Sam had made a lot of understatements in his life, but that was possibly the biggest one. He couldn’t count the times he had been sitting at the library’s table, doing research for a hunter who’d just called or reading something just for his concentration to be shattered Meg screeching like the demon she was at her exercise’s book.

“It’s not that hard, Meg,” Castiel usually tried to cheer her up. “See, if you do it like this…”

“Nope,” Meg said, throwing the pencil away. “I’m not doing this. I refuse. This is torture.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be an expert at enduring torture?” Dean asked, obviously amused at Meg’s frustration.

“They never make us do something like this in Hell,” Meg said. “It’s far too cruel, even for us.”

“Oh, come on, it can be that bad,” Dean snickered. “It’s just numbers and…”

At that point, he had looked over the demon’s shoulder and made a face like someone had just forced a rotten lemon down his throat.

“Yeah, you’re right, this is madness,” he agreed, after a few seconds of staring at the page, dumbfounded.

“Told you!” Meg exclaimed. “How are we even supposed to understand this?”

“Well, you need to learn it, Meg,” Castiel said. “Otherwise, it’ll be even more difficult when we start seeing imaginary numbers…”

“There’s imaginary numbers coming up next?!” Meg had shouted. “What, the real ones aren’t enough? Fuck this!”

At which point, she had stood up and disappearing inside her room with a string of swear words in all kinds of languages falling from her lips.

“Well, it’s just a matter of adjusting,” Mrs. Periwinkle said as she poured the hot water on a couple of small cups. “She’s a smart girl, she will get it eventually.”

Mrs. Periwinkle was fully aware than Meg and Castiel weren’t actually children, but she treated them and talked about them as if they were so much that Sam sometimes wanted to ask her if she’d forgotten that minor fact about them. But that would have been rude, and besides, he needed the old, small witch to give him some answers.

“The reason I’m here is this,” he said, pulling out the cardigan from the bag.

“You need me to fix it, dear?” Mrs. Periwinkle asked. She looked for something inside the pockets of her apron and took out a pair of glass that made her eyes look enormous when she put them on. She examined the cardigan with a hand over her chin, like an art expert would examine a painting to find out if it was an original or not. “Well, I don’t see any tearing, and none of the buttons are missing. In fact, it looks brand new.”

“Yeah, that’s not the problem,” Sam began, but he was interrupted when _Pericles_ entered the kitchen, strutting prideful with a sweater very similar to the one’s Meg and Cas’ cats had been getting.

“Oh, _Pericles_ , there you are,” said Mrs. Periwinkle when the familiar jumped on the table. “You look very handsome,” she added scratching the cat’s ears. “Yes, you do.”

“That’s very pretty,” Sam commented. “Did you make it?”

“I’m afraid I hadn’t had the time,” Mrs. Periwinkle smiled. “I have been very busy with all the Winter Solstice’s preparations. I have some friends coming over. I haven’t seen them in a couple of centuries.”

“Oh, that’s very nice,” Sam said. “So you know who did it? _Pericles’_ sweater and this cardigan?”

“Why, of course,” the witch shrugged. “You don’t?”

Sam didn’t want to admit he didn’t and that it was driving him slightly insane that everybody but him knew the origins of the sweaters or didn’t care at all to find out. And the worst part was, as the temperatures kept getting lower and the bunker became a freezing death trap, Sam found himself wearing the cardigan during the mornings and cold afternoons. He still fully expected to start shrinking and kill him, but as the days went by, it was obvious it was obvious it was nothing but a piece of wool.

“Oh, my God, look at this!” Charlie exclaimed when she opened the present of her Secret Santa that year. It was a blue and bronze scarf with what seemed to be a little brown eagle embroidered in one of the ends. “It’s so cute; I’m going to wear it all the time!”

And suiting action to the word, she wrapped it around her neck with a big, happy smile. Sam had to resist the impulse to rip it from her and throw it in the fire, but seeing that the scarf was not strangling her suddenly, he figured it was just as innocuous as the sweaters and the hand-knit oven mittens Dean was proudly wearing while he brought out the Christmas turkey he had been working on all afternoon.

“There we go,” he said, setting the platter in the middle of the table for everybody to grab a piece.

Cas immediately started filling his plate to the brim. Meg hurried to do the same, because it was clear the angel had all the intentions to finish the turkey by himself.

“Thank you,” Charlie said, hugging Dean when the hunter sat by her side. “I love it.”

“I’m glad,” Dean said and patted her on the shoulder. “But you haven’t even tried it yet. I think the stuffing might be a little too salty…”

“I meant the scarf,” Charlie said. Dean blinked in confusion. “Wait, you aren’t my Secret Santa?”

“No, I got Meg this year.”

“Well, _that_ explains it,” Meg groaned, glaring at her brand new DVD copy of _The Exorcist 2_.

Charlie turned towards Sam, who shook his head. However, he felt like he was at the edge of finding out who was the mysterious knitter, and that it was clearly someone within that room, and that could only meant…

“Oh,” Charlie looked at Meg with astonishment. “Well, thank you, Meg. I didn’t know you were taking Home Economics as an elective…”

“I’m not,” Meg shrugged.

“She’s going the easy route and taking a language she already knows…” Dean started, but Meg interrupted him with a sneer.

“And risk being exorcised by someone mispronouncing a word? I don’t think so,” she said, rolling her eyes. “I’m taking World Politics.”

“Okay, why?”

“As part of my plan to become the undisputed Ruler of Hell once I grow up again,” Meg said, as if it was glaringly obvious and Dean was stupid for asking. “What did you think I was going to do, go to college?”

“Well, no, not exactly,” Dean said, actually impressed that Meg was thinking that far ahead.

“So wait, if you’re not taking Home Economics, and none of you is my Secret Santa…” Charlie said.

Sam, who had been watching Castiel eat piece after piece of turkey, finally said out loud what he suspected:

“Cas, are you knitting all these sweaters and things?”

“Yeah…”

“Don’t speak with your mouth full!” Dean snapped. Castiel chewed a couple of times more and then swallowed.

“Yes, Sam,” he said, looking at him all big eyes and innocence. “I thought you knew. Dean told me to get a hobby I could do at school. I decided on this because videogames are disruptive and against the rules, as Meg has been told multiple times before all the professors who’ve tried to stop her mysteriously pass out…”

Meg threw her DVD at him, but Sam was far too distracted to get mad at her for whatever she was doing to her professors. He had been so wary and paranoid, and he hadn’t even thought that Cas could be the mysterious knitter…

What started as a mild giggle at how stupid and ridiculous he had been became a roar of laughter when Dean asked what was so funny. For the next five minutes, Sam couldn’t stop, not even until his sides were hurting and he was gasping for air pathetically. By this point, everyone else was laughing too, even when they clearly weren’t exactly sure what the joke was.

“Oh, wow,” Charlie said, wiping her eyes when they could recover a little. “I don’t remember the last time I laughed like that.”

“Me neither,” Sam admitted.

Although, he would certainly never forget the next time he laughed like that. It was on February, when Meg walked inside the kitchen sporting a white sweater with a big, red heart stamped in the middle of it. Castiel was wearing a matching one, and he looked pretty happy about it.

“Not a word,” Meg growled when she saw Sam opening his mouth to comment on it.

Sam managed it to keep it together until the little monsters finished her breakfast and left. Dean found him with his head buried in his arms and his shoulders shaking convulsively.

“Don’t tell me,” he said. “Cas’ taken up sewing?”

Sam was pretty certain he was going to choke. Dean still didn’t know what was so funny, but it was good to see his brother happy.


	6. Fools

For the most part, March passed with only two remarkable things happening.

Garth showed up with some scorch marks from fighting a Wendigo and had to stick for a few days until he was cured, which was fun for everybody. Cas and Meg had outgrown his sock puppets (not that Meg would ever admit she ever liked them, to begin with) but Garth still managed to make them happy by proposing a gory movies marathon.

“That looks greatly unrealistic,” Castiel commented, while the girl on the screen cut her own arm off for some twisted reason.

“And it’s not even five minutes in yet,” Meg complained with a yawn. “This is boring, Garth.”

Garth didn’t answer. He was too busy hugging a pillow and biting his nails to the bone.

Then, a few weeks later, _Mr. Whiskers_ came down with a bad case of fleas, which Dean blamed on letting him out to play in the woods with all the little critters that inhabited it. The best part was that meant they had to bath both cats in order to help them. _Mephistopheles_ was just as unhappy with the deal as Meg was.

“Why does he have to take a bath?” she asked, refusing to move from the couch while her cat hid in her arms and hissed furiously at whoever dared to try and get closer. “He’s not the one who caught the damn things!”

“It’s okay, _Whiskers_ ,” Castiel was saying to his cat, who was trembling and meowing pathetically in the towel they had wrapped him in. The little angel was cradling him to his chest, sitting in one of the library’s chair closer to a plug. “You’ll be dry again as soon as Dean finds Meg’s hair dryer.”

“And that’s another thing,” Meg complained. “Who exactly gave you permission to go through my stuff?”

Sam was about to insist she handed the cat for bathing, when Dean walked in with the dryer.

“Dammit, Meg, you need to clean that mess you call room. I think I stepped on a lipstick bar,” he said, as he plugged it in. As usual, Meg pretended she didn’t hear him, but Dean refrained from repeating himself while he tried to figure out how to turn the dryer on. “Okay, I think I got it…”

A blow of hot air emerged from its mouth, and the effect was too immediate and too sudden to follow. _Mr. Whiskers_ started wriggling in terror, and Cas, realizing there was no way to hold him still without hurting him, let go of him. The cat dashed across the library while meowing hysterically and disappeared around the hallway, at which point Meg stood up so suddenly _Mephistopheles_ fell from her lap.

“He better not be going to my room!” Meg shouted.

“ _Mr. Whiskers_ , come back here!”

What followed was a frantic persecution for the wet cat. He wasn’t hard to follow, because he dripped everywhere, but he moved fast enough that by the time they caught up with him, he had dashed for safety elsewhere. In the end, they found him in the laundry room, hiding beneath a pile of clean clothes. _Mephistopheles_ was saved from his bath because Dean was too busy having a screaming fit and Sam trying to calm him down.

So all in all, March was a pretty laid back month, and Dean was certainly sad to see it go.

And he was even sadder when he opened his eyes one afternoon and realized it was the April 1st.

The first thing he did was pat his own head, but apparently his eyebrows were still in place, his hair had not been cut or shaven in any way, and there wasn’t any slick or suspicious substances in his face. He went to double-check in the bathroom mirror just in case, but there was nothing anywhere in his body, his clothes had not been slashed and there was nothing inside of his shoes. When he went to make breakfast, he made sure the coffee had not been defaced in any way, that salt and sugar where in their respective containers, and that there were no plastic scorpions or live spiders inside the cereal box.

All of which didn’t make him any less apprehensive, because if Meg hadn’t gone for any petty pranks that early in the morning, it could only mean she was saving up a big, awful one for later.

Sam walked into the kitchen, looking over his shoulder, like he too was expecting to be attacked at any moment. His hair looked about the same length as it had been the day before.

“She didn’t get you?” Dean asked. He didn’t need to clarify who or why.

“No,” Sam said, eyes wide open as if he was certain there was something absolutely wrong about it. “It’s so weird. I’ve checked: there aren’t any booby traps or…”

Both brothers went quiet when Meg and Castiel walked in the kitchen. As usual, Castiel looked like he hadn’t slept a wink, and glared at Dean with brooding, tired eyes when he wished her good morning. Meg, on the other hand, look pretty happy, and even started humming as she poured the milk on her cereal.

“Well, hi, Meg,” Sam said, trying to take a discreet approach to the subject. “You look good this morning.”

“Why, thank you, Sam,” she replied, with a little smirk that sent shivers down Sam’s spine. “It’s the eyeliner.”

“You’re not supposed to wear make-up to school…” Dean began reminding her, but went quiet when Sam kicked him on the shin under the table.

“So… you got any special plans?”

Castiel groaned and kept eating his breakfast, and Meg just shrugged.

“Why? Is there something important happening today?” she asked. She was looking at them with wide eyes full of innocence, and the Winchesters didn’t buy it for a second.

“It’s April’s Fools,” Dean said, unwittingly ruining Sam’s careful approach to the subject. “You’re behind schedule. Usually, by this time, you’ve already played some sort of sick and horrifying prank on us.”

“Oh, that,” Meg said, like she’d only just remembered. “Yeah, I don’t think I’ll be doing that this year.”

Dean blinked in astonishment, and then turned to his brother. Upon seeing that Sam looked just as confused at him, he came to the conclusion that those words had actually left Meg’s mouth and that he must have heard them right. Even Castiel looked a little more attentive than before.

“But you love playing pranks on people,” he said.

“Exactly,” Meg said, sipping the rest of her milk with all the dignity of the hellish princess she was. “People. You know where there are people? At school. Those little punks will be trying to out-prank each other all day.” Her eyes were shining at this point. She put her backpack on the table, where everybody could see it looked heavier and bumpier than before. “I’ve been preparing myself all week for this. So that’s why I didn’t have time to do something for you, guys. No offense.”

“None taken,” Sam said.

“Hey, we can wait until next year,” Dean shrugged. “No problem.”

“Okay, then,” Meg said, standing up and grabbing Castiel’s arm. “Come on, Cas, I wanna get a head start on those amateurs.”

Cas managed to snatch another toast before dragged him out of the kitchen.

“That’s some actual good forward thinking from her,” Sam said.

“Yeah,” Dean agreed. “Maybe when she’s Queen of Hell, things will run smoothly and we’ll have some peace ‘round these parts.”

“Sure,” Sam laughed, lifting his cup of coffee. Just as it was about to touch his lips, he froze. “Wait a second,” he said, putting it down and looking at it like he expected it to become a scorpion. “What if _that_ is the prank?”

“What?”

“What if the prank is that she wants us to believe that she prepared no pranks for us so we’ll let our guards down, but in fact there’s something horrible and possibly death-threatening in the laundry room?” Sam continued, his eyes opening in horror. Dean returned his brother’s gaze, with the same expression on his face, but then he calmed down.

“No, wait, she knows we were going to think that,” he said. “So what if she told us she didn’t prepare a prank, knowing we’ll think she did, and we’ll spend the whole day paranoid and scared of there being something horrible, when everything’s actually just fine?”

“That makes sense,” Sam said, calming down a little. Immediately, he got tensed again. “But if what if she meant to lull us into that sense of false security?”

Dean didn’t know what to answer. They stayed there for a long time, staring at the breakfast’s leftovers, trying to figure out what Meg’s play was. None of them dared to check the laundry room.

 

* * *

 

The school looked pretty normal when Meg and Castiel arrived and chained up their bicycles.

“Are you sure this is going to be as terrible as you’ve said?” Castiel asked. “In our old school, April’s Fools wasn’t that of a big deal.”

“You should have learnt by now that this is high school, Clarence,” Meg replied, unzipping her backpack. “Rules are different here.”

“What are these?” Castiel asked when Meg handed him a brown paper bag that contained what seemed to be homemade cookies. “Can I have one?”

“Sure, if you want to miss a period or two for being in the bathroom,” Meg shrugged, as she continued to look for something in her bag. “They’re laced with laxatives. I’m thinking about giving them to Mr. Kendall.”

“Meg, you could get in real trouble for that,” Castiel warned, frowning.

“Okay, fine,” Meg rolled her eyes. “I’ll just hand them out to unsuspecting victims.”

“Hello, guys.”

“Hello, Peggy,” they said in unison as their human friend approached them.

“Cookie?” Meg asked, snatching the paper bag from Castiel’s hand. She didn’t notice the angel vigorously shaking his head, like he needed to.

“Are they actually sweet?” Peggy asked, narrowing her eyes at Meg. “Did you make them with like, hot peppers or something?”

“Oh, good, so you’re aware,” Meg smirked. “Keep that up and you might survive this day yet. You guys run along now. I have to go to the lab.”

“What is she going to do at the lab?” Peggy asked with a shudder, as Meg scurried away.

“You know, I think the less we know, the better,” Castiel replied.

They walked into the school, where groups of people were gathered around lockers, laughing and talking like it was just another normal day. But Castiel did notice some of them looking around with apprehension and some of them jumping aside when opening their lockers for fear of something falling out.

“I’ve been thinking of getting a part-time job this summer,” Peggy commented as she loaded some books on her backpack. “You know, to save up for college. Our freshman year is ending, and we should start thinking about the future. Do you and Meg ever think about the future?”

Castiel, who had been eyeing a group of boys standing at the other end of the hallway because they were chuckling suspiciously at them, snapped back to the conversation.

“Well, sometimes,” he said, cautiously. “Meg has an interest in a… political career.”

“I thought so,” Peggy nodded, like that made entirely too much sense. “And you?”

“I don’t know,” Castiel shrugged. “I guess I want to help people.”

That was the vaguest of ambitions ever, but it did described in general terms what Castiel thought he could do with himself once he recovered his wings and most of his powers. Meg would be too busy ruling Hell and Sam and Dean would be busy… doing something, he guessed. And he knew he wouldn’t be welcome in Heaven, so he would like very much to stay on Earth and travel, contemplate his Father’s creation and help his children. And of course, there was always the distinct possibility that some world-threatening menace appeared and tried to destroy all forms of human lives again, so he’d rather be around just in case.

Peggy nodded.

“I mean, I can definitely see you doing that,” she said.

“Do you?”

“Yeah,” Peggy said. “You definitely have the… attitude for it.”

There were some unspoken words left floating around. Peggy was a smart girl, and she had known or suspected for a while that her friends weren’t exactly like everybody else (and also weren’t exactly cousins like they would have everyone believe). She didn’t question what they were as a child, and Castiel assumed she thought it’d be rude to bring it up at that point in their friendships. But it was something that usually went unmentioned, and Castiel had the feeling that if she discovered the truth then, that wouldn’t change the fact Peggy was their friend (Meg sometimes referred to her as _their_ human, much in the same way she called the Winchester _their_ hunters).

Of course, some people just didn’t get the memo that they were supposed to back off from humans that were protected by the tiniest potencies in all of Heaven and Hell.

One of the boys from the group Castiel had been eyeing earlier strode towards them with a big grin in his acne ridden face. Castiel’s guard got immediately up, even though the boy was just a sophomore in a green striped shirt not much taller than him. He didn’t look particularly menacing, but if the angel had learnt something from living with Meg all those years, was that on April’s Fools everything had the potential to be menacing.

“Hello, Margaret,” he said out loud, hiding his hands behind his back.

Peggy looked around, but it was obvious there weren’t any more girls called Margaret around.

“Uh… I’m sorry?” she said, clearly taken aback. “Do we… know each other?”

“I’m Gary. You’re in my Advance French class,” the boy reminded her. “I sit behind you, and you once lent me a pen.”

“Oh, yeah,” Peggy remembered. “You never gave it back to me.”

Gary’s neck turned red and his smiled wavered a little, but the shame from having stolen Peggy’s pen wasn’t enough to send him running from the hills.

“Anyway,” the boy continued, and his voice got a little weaker. He cleared his throat, with his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing up and down a few times. “Anyway… I was thinking maybe we could go to the movies sometimes,” he continued, and finally showed his hands. Castiel was ready to knock off whatever it was away from Peggy, but it turned out to be only a white paper flower. “If you want.”

Peggy blinked a couple of times, like she wasn’t entirely sure she had heard right. She looked at Gary’s extended hand, and then back up at the voice’s face.

“You’re going to have to try harder,” she told him.

“What?” Gary asked, his smile definitely faltering now.

“I said, you’re going to have to try harder if you want to prank me,” Peggy said. “I’m well aware of what day is today. I’m not falling for that.”

Gary’s face immediately became a mask of horror, probably at being caught so easily.

“No,” he tried to excuse himself. “I didn’t mean… I…”

At that point, Castiel felt compelled to intervene.

“It’s very rude to ask someone out as a prank,” he said, taking a step in order to get all up in Gary’s personal space (Meg had told him some humans found that intimidating). “I suggest you walk away right this minute.”

The growled in his voice and the intensity in his face was enough to send Gary running in the opposite direction. At the other end of the hallway, his friends were hooting with laughter. They obviously didn’t care much about the outcome of the joke.

“I’m sorry about that, Peggy,” Castiel told his friend. “You don’t deserve that kind of thing.”

“It’s okay,” Peggy said, hugging her books to her chest. “I half-expected it, to be honest. Meg warned me some guys might try that.”

Though she tried to shrug it off, Castiel could notice she was a little crestfallen by the way she kept glancing at her shoes while they walk towards their first class. He fidgeted with his fingers, nervously. He didn’t know what to say to make her feel better, so he felt relieved when she changed the topic.

“What do you think she is doing, by the way?”

“I can’t even imagine,” Castiel said, with a shudder.


	7. Simplicity

Getting up on the school’s roof was a piece of cake. The door wasn’t even closed to begin with. Meg couldn’t believe how lousy the security in that school was: the lock in the laboratory’s cupboard took around thirty seconds to pick, and teachers didn’t even care to take a second look at her obviously faked hall pass. At this point, Meg was thinking they _deserved_ to be pranked for being so careless about everything.

She reached the ventilation turret and put her backpack down to start getting what she needed… when a strangled noise startled her. She looked around, but the rooftop was as empty as it had been a second before. Shrugging it off, she turned her attention back to the task in hand, but the strangled sound came out again. It sounded like someone was halfway through choking while suppressing a heartbreaking sob.

“Hello?” Meg called out.

Someone moved at the other side of the turret. There was a thing boy with a green striped shirt there. He had his eyes swollen and red, and a half-destroyed paper flower in his hand, for some reason.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” the boy said, sniffling. “I thought I was alone.”

Meg eyed him carefully, but after a moment, she decided he didn’t represent a threat and started taking out the bottles she needed from her backpack.

“What are you doing?” the boy asked, after a few seconds of watching her work in silence.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Meg asked, as she spilled the content of her bottles down the ventilation turret.

“I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t,” the boy said, fidgeting with the flower paper nervously.

“I’d like to see you come and stop me, tough guy,” Meg taunted him.

The boy stood there for another couple of seconds, and then decided that his own misery was probably more interesting and safer than bringing down Meg’s rage onto him. He sat against the turret and resumed his quiet sobbing. He positively sounded like a small that had been kicked and didn’t understand why. It was distracting and annoying, so after a few minutes, Meg couldn’t help but to ask:

“Hey… you,” she called him.

“Gary,” the boy said.

“Gary,” Meg repeated. “What is your issue?”

Gary cleaned his nose against the sleeve of his shirt.

“I wanted to ask a girl out,” he said, obviously relief that he could rely onto someone with his personal tragedy.

“And what, she kicked you to the curb?”

“Worse,” the boy cried. “She didn’t even believe me. She thought I was pranking her.”

“Well, you could have picked a better day for it, that’s for sure,” Meg commented, still focus on getting all the liquid down the ventilation system.

“I didn’t know it was April’s Fools!” Gary defended himself, crossing his arms against his chest like he felt offended Meg thought he was trying to trick the girl on propose. “My friends said that today was the day, and that I needed to grow a pair. None of them warn me.”

“So they pranked you by having you prank someone else by mistake?” Meg asked.

That was actually not bad. It was risky and manipulative and there were several ways in which it could have gone wrong (the girl could have say yes, the boy could have remembered what day it was), but she had to admired the thought and cruelty that went into it.

“And now she probably thinks I’m a jerk and won’t ever talk to me again,” Gary added, broodily looking into the horizon like he was already picturing the years of painful solitude he was doomed to endure.

Despite herself, Meg felt a little sorry for him. She put the bottles down and fished for something else inside her backpack.

“Here,” she said, handing the boy a brown bag.

“What is it?” the boy asked, eyeing it with suspicion.

“Vengeance.”

Gary hesitated for a moment, like he wasn’t sure how much of a good idea it’d be to alienate his so-called friends with a unknown prank handed to him by Meg Masters (yes, he was fully aware of who she was and had heard the crazy rumors going on about her). But in the end, he probably decided that with friends like those, he didn’t need any enemies, so he took the bag.

“Cookies?” he asked confused, when he looked inside.

“Don’t eat any yourself,” Meg warned him, with her most serious and intimidating tone. “Or you might be cursed with a pain akin to fire eating your insides and rendering you a disgusting mess of liquefied shit. Now scram, and don’t tell anybody you saw me here or else.”

Gary looked at her for another second, and then turned around and ran with the annoying sensation he had just made a pact of some sort.

Meg hummed happily as she continued to pour the chemicals down the ventilation system. This was going to be the best April’s Fools ever.

 

* * *

 

Meg reappeared for History class, the last one before lunch break and sat on her desk. She was happily whistling a tune that Castiel didn’t recognize, and the fact she looked so pleased with herself troubled him.

“Tell me again what exactly are you planning to do?” Castiel asked, cringing.

“I didn’t tell you to begin with,” she pointed out.

“Meg…”

“Oh, relax,” Meg rolled her eyes. “No human lives will be at risk. There might be some material damage, but I promise it’s perfectly safe.”

Castiel still was uncertain of how much he believed that, but he decided to give her the benefit of the doubt until she had ripped the fruits from her work.

The class passed without any incidents. Meg didn’t check the clock, or shift on her seat, or give out any indications that she was anxiously waiting for something. But the smug beam on her face remained, and the fact she was pretending to take careful notes of what the professor was saying was troubling all by itself.

Finally, the bell rang. Castiel half-expected to see Meg picking up all her stuff and practically dashing through the door like she did in normal days. But that day in particular, she took her time to pick up item by item before carefully placing them inside her bag. By the time she had finished, the classroom was almost empty, expect for the two of them and some students gathering up around the professor’s desk to ask him some questions.

“What do you feel like eating today, Clarence?” Meg asked happily, like she didn’t have an evil plan about to unfold.

Castiel was about to say that whatever was in the school’s canteen would be fine by him, because he was practically starving, but before they even reached the door, an acute, prolonged ringing began echoing around the hall. Everybody in the near vicinity looked up in confusion, and Castiel could be wrong, but he could have sworn he saw Meg raising a fist in the air.

“What is that?!” Castiel asked, screaming to make himself heard above the noise.

“The fire alarm,” Meg replied with a shrug. “I guess now we must evacuate calmly with everyone else…”

The fact was, not many people were rushing to the doors. Knowing what day it was, everyone seemed sure that it was more likely than some would-be prankster had pulled the alarm than the building actually being on fire. Most of them continued on the hallway, business as usual, some covering their ears, others laughing at the audacity. Meg, however, kept advancing towards the exit without letting go of Castiel’s hand.

“Meg,” he asked, suddenly worried. “What is going on?”

“Nothing right now,” she replied, looking at her clock. “But give it another half minute.”

Exactly twenty seven seconds later (Castiel counted) the alarm was turned off, but by then, the water sprinklers had been activated. The hallway began to get wet as everyone run for cover, and Meg’s work finally paid off.

It was subtle at first, so subtle that not many people noticed it. It began with a couple of bubbles floating in around, which caused more delight than confusion. Then the bubbles began multiplying, and before anyone could tell how or why, the walls began foaming.

Well, specifically, the air vents began foaming: white, thick spume falling from the vents, flooding the halls and the classrooms, cascading down on the heads of those who were unfortunate enough to be standing near. In another minute, the school’s floor was completely covered in white, and the air was invaded by more and more bubbles floating madly in every direction.

The teachers, first unaware of what was going on, and then hit in the face with the reality that the hallways had become a tripping hazard, began shouting that everybody should go to the doors without running and keeping the calm.

“Please, children, form an organize line!” Professor Kendall was saying. “Please, be careful, the floor’s slippery, we don’t want anyone getting injured…

Someone threw a handful of foam towards the nearest teacher.

And then the entire school _rioted_.

Everyone jumped inside the foam, only to emerge covered in bubbles and with wet clothes, laughing out loud with pure joy, blowing bubbles in their friends faces, taking pictures and filming themselves sliding on their butts across the halls. The professors tried to order everyone to be calm and evacuate, but no one was listening or paying attention to anything that wasn’t their own fun and games.

From the door, still holding Castiel’s hand in hers, Meg was smiling, triumphal.

“Not bad, huh?”

“How did you do it?” Castiel asked, frowning.

“Some chemicals here, some chemicals there, a little bit of magic. It was quite simple…”

“No, I mean pulling the fire alarm,” Castiel replied. “You were with me the whole time. Not even you can be in two places at the same time.”

“Oh, please, Cas. Pulling the fire alarm is School Pranking 101,” Meg laughed. “I knew it was bound to happen. It’s so predictable.”

“So now the school has to fix this mess,” Castiel said, pointing at the disastrous hallway filled with laughing teenagers. “And whoever pulled the fire alarm will take the fall for this too.”

“That’s the best part!” Meg said. “I get to do the crime without doing the time!”

“Meg…” Castiel began protesting, but he couldn’t go on. She had caught a bubble in her fingers and was delicately guided it over to Castiel’s nose, where it popped. The angel blinked a couple of times, and Meg laughed again at his confusion.

“Come on, have some fun!” she said, and before Castiel was ready, she pulled him with her underneath the invading spume. They emerged wet and shivering, and Castiel did not understand why Meg was pointing at his face and screaming: “Foam beard!” until he shook his head and several bubbles fell from his chin.

And he had to admit, that was pretty funny, so the next thing he knew was that he was holding on to Meg, trying to stand up again with her, only to promptly fall back on their butts, and both of them laughing at the top of their lungs just like all the other students around them. The professors had given up at that point, and were just looking around in disbelief from their classroom’s door, half-fearing, half-wishing a kid would get hurt just so they could say “I told you so!” and ordered everybody to get out.

Peggy slid towards them by hanging onto the locker’s handles.

“You did this?” she asked, with a mix of admiration and horror.

“You can’t prove anything,” Meg shrugged, and gave Peggy a friendly push in the shoulder to get her to let go off the walls.

Peggy stumbled backwards, and practically fell into the arms of the boy with the green striped shirt. He held her by the shoulders for a moment, and when Peggy was stabilized again, he let her go while flushing furiously.

“Hey, Gary,” Meg greeted him.

“You know each other?” Castiel asked, narrowing his eyes.

“We’ve met,” Meg replied, with a shrug. “How do you like this thing?”

“It’s nice, I guess,” Gary said. He had his hands in his pocket and was very pointedly looking at his shoes. “I lost the beginning of it, though. I was too busy escorting my friends… former friends to the bathroom.”

“And?” Meg asked, opening her eyes with anticipation.

“It smells like someone died in there now.”

Castiel frowned, not sure what Gary was talking about, but Meg let out a cackle.

“That’s the spirit!” she said, offering her fist for Gary to bump it.

Peggy and Castiel exchanged confused looks over their friends. Before they could asked anything, Principal Gonzalez skidded out of her office and hanged onto the staircase’s rail for support.

“Listen, everybody, LISTEN!” she shouted, and the chaos going in stopped long enough for her to deliver her message: “In lieu of the current circumstances, I have called your parents and told them classes are cancelled for the rest of the day…”

A roar of euphoria followed her words, but by how she was blushing and how furious she looked, Castiel guessed that wasn’t the reaction she was aiming for.

“Listen to me, LISTEN!” she ordered again. “I don’t know who did this, or how, but this clearly a violation to school’s rules. Believe me, when we find out who’s to blame for this, the perpetrator o perpetrators of this ill-conceived joke will be severely punished. If you have any information about the matter, or if you would like to confess your participation in it, this is the time to come clean.”

There was a heavy silence. Then:

“Yo, we ain’t no snitches!” someone screamed.

And just like that, all the students went back to playing with foam (which had lost its whiteness and was beginning to fade by now) and sliding on the hallway.

Meg snickered, lifting her chin proudly in the air.

“You guys want to get out of here and have some ice cream?”

“Are you trying to bribe me with ice scream so I don’t tell anybody what I saw?” Gary asked.

“Oh, no, I don’t bribe,” Meg replied. “When I want to get away with something, I issue threats of eternal damnation and pain beyond the imaginable.”

Peggy and Castiel both nodded gravely, and Gary seemed to understand that was how things were done in that group.

“I’ll just take the ice cream,” he shrugged.

 

* * *

 

Half an hour later, they were in a booth in their favorite ice cream parlor, and Gary was profusely apologizing to Peggy.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel bad,” he was saying, while nervously fidgeting with a napkin in front of him. “Can you forgive me?”

Peggy stared at him, and blinked very slowly behind her glasses.

“So when you… asked me out,” she said, slowly, like she was confirming some very important information she had received. “You were actually asking me out?”

“Yes,” Gary confirmed, his ears suddenly getting pink. “I was.”

“Oh.”

There was a moment of silent only interrupted by Meg’s gulping down her banana split. She was clearly still basking in her success and not really interested in what was going on with the two little humans sitting in front of her. Castiel, on the other hand, hadn’t even touched his cone and was giving Gary the stinking eye, trying to determine if he was being honest or if he was still trying to pull Peggy’s leg. In which, he would need to execute a swift and subtle attack on the boy’s physical integrity.

But that wasn’t necessary, because Peggy (with her face as red as Gary’s ears) smiled. It was hard to know when she was actually smiling, thanks to her braces, but the sides of her mouth twitches voluntarily, and by the way she straightened her shoulders, she looked a lot more confident.

“So,” she said. “What kind of movies do you like?”

Gary’s face lightened up, and in two seconds, they were both discussing what they were going to watch that Friday, completely ignoring Meg and Castiel’s presence.

“Humans are so complicated,” Meg sighed, watching them and shaking her head.

“Sometimes,” Castiel agreed, relaxing in his seat. At least for now, Gary’s life was safe.

“I’m so glad we’re not like that,” Meg added, and to Castiel’s surprise, she leaned against his shoulder, affectionately. Castiel beamed down at her.

“Yeah,” he said. “Do you want some of my cone?”

“I’m always slut for taking other people’s food!” Meg said, slightly louder than it was necessary. Peggy and Gary stared at her for a second, and then returned to their plans:

“Okay, but you’re going to have to talk to my mom…”

Castiel lower his cone towards Meg. She licked her lips in anticipation, and opened her mouth…

The cone deviated slightly up, painting the tip of her nose with just a little bit of ice cream. Meg growled in frustration and sat up again.

“What…?”

“April’s fool,” Castiel replied, with a shrug.

Meg blinked at him for a moment.

“You’re dead, Clarence.”

Gary and Peggy weren’t exactly sure what happened next, but they knew it involved Castiel running out of the both, followed closely by Meg, who had murder in her eyes. They didn’t see them crossing the door, but they must have, because when they looked around the parlor, they were nowhere to be found. After a few seconds, it dawned on them that they had been left completely alone.

“So…” Gary cleared his throat nervously. “Do you wanna share another cone?”

“Okay,” Peggy said, staring at her shoes.

 

* * *

 

Sam was carefully examining his laptop before daring to turn it on, just in case. So far there hadn’t been anything wrong with the bunker (the water tank hadn’t been altered with any sort of dye, the temperature of the shower had been exactly what he expected it to be, and Dean had reported no suspicious activity in the washing room), but he still wasn’t sure Meg hadn’t prepared some sort of twisted joke for them. In the end, when he was convinced everything was fine, he turned it on just as the bunker’s door swung open and the kids got inside.

Almost as if some sort of sixth sense had warned him of it, Dean came out of the kitchen.

“Stop right there,” he said, giving them their most severe look. “School called hours ago saying they were sending everybody home early. Something about a flood. Do I have to assume you had something to do with it?”

“Assume whatever you like, Dean Winchester,” Meg said, as she sat down and put her feet up on the table.

“Don’t do that, we eat there!” Dean pointed out with a groan. “And what’s that thing on your nose?”

Meg wiped her nose with her sleeve, at the same time she glared at Castiel, who wouldn’t stop snickering.

“Do I have to ground you, young lady?” Dean continued, crossing his arms over his chest.

Usually that was followed up by an explosion of “You’re not my dad!” or “You have no right!” but Meg was apparently so content with her triumph that she only shrugged.

“Do it. I’ll take the extra time to plan my prank for next year,” she said. “It’s going to have to be big if I want to top what I did today.”

She stood up and happily strutted away towards her bedroom. Dean sat down and hid his face inside his arms, frustrated.

“What are we going to with her?” he asked.

Sam clicked the Internet browser to open it.

“Well, we could…”

An unholy shriek that sounded a little like a thousand nails being dragged on a chalkboard echoed around the library, at the same time a horribly disfigured face jumped at Sam from the monitor. The hunter punched his laptop to get it away from him, at the same time he lost balance of the chair he was sitting in and fell on the floor. When he looked up, he saw Dean had a gun in his hand and was pointing it at the computer with eyes wide open, while Castiel had climbed onto the shelves for some reason.

Meg’s satisfied snickered floated from the hallway.

“You didn’t really think I’ve forgotten about you, did you?”


	8. Guests

“Cas?”

Castiel froze in the middle of the hallway. His first impulse was to try and disappear, but he figured that might have looked too suspicious. So instead, he straightened his shoulders and turned around to look at Dean, who was standing there with just his boxers and his old blue robe.

“Oh, good morning, Dean,” he said, forcing a smile.

Dean rubbed his eyes (obviously still not completely awake), and looked at his watch.

“Why are you up so early?”

“I was… well, I thought I would…” Castiel stuttered, fidgeting with his shirt. “Just… wanted to start the day early.”

“You do know you’re on vacations, right?” Dean asked, with a yawn. “That’s the point of summer. Go back to bed and sleep until noon, like Meg does.”

Almost as if he had summoned her, Meg opened her bedroom door with _Mr. Whiskers_ in her arms. She saw Dean standing on the hallway, and Castiel shaking his head to warn her, and promptly retreated back inside.

“Of course, yes, that is some sound advice you’re giving me,” Castiel said, turning his shaking into an agreeable nod. “I will follow it right away. Thank you, Dean.”

And he practically escaped towards his room.

Dean narrowed his eyes in that direction before being startled by _Mr. Whiskers_ rubbing his body against his legs.

“And where did you come from?” the hunter asked, picking up the cat.

_Whiskers_ just turned around to show Dean his belly.

“You sure you’re a cat?” Dean asked as he scratched him. “’Cause, buddy, I bet other cats think you’re a shameful display for liking these things.”

_Whiskers_ didn’t seem to care what other cats thought, because he started purring in content.

Unluckily for him, his petting session was interrupted by several knocks on the door. Dean put the cat down (who meowed in protest) and closed his robe before climbing the stairs to open the door. The only person who occasionally showed up around there was Mrs. Periwinkle, and she wouldn’t mind if he was making himself comfortable in his own home.

However, when he opened the door, Dean wished he’d at least put on some pants.

“Well, hello, dear!” Rowena greeted him with her signature face-splitting grin. “Long time, no see!”

“Ro… Rowena?” Dean said, as he grabbed the sides of his robe in an attempt to close it a little bit more. “What are you…?”

“Oh, come here,” Rowena said, grabbing him by the shoulders and pulling him to kiss him in both cheeks. “Come on, we’re practically family!”

“We are not… we are so not…” Dean tried to protest, but then he got distracted. “Why are you dressed like that?”

Instead of her usual long, elegant dresses in dark colors, Rowena was wearing a knee-length white dress with sunflowers all over it and white sandals that at least still kept the vertiginous heels she liked to sport. Her bright red hair was tied up in a loose ponytail, and she looked a few years younger than Dean remembered from the last time he saw her.

“You like it?” Rowena asked, putting her hands on her hips to better display her outfit. “It’s my summer look! Isn’t it gorgeous?”

“Uh…”

“Oh, of course, I didn’t come alone,” she said, as if answering a question Dean hadn’t asked. She looked outside the door and shouted: “Fergus! Stop putting that thing in your mouth and come say hello!”

Crowley hadn’t grown up a lot in terms of height, but he had definitely got rounder. Rowena had put on some green shorts that looked a bit too tight in his cubby legs and an orange t-shirt with a yellow little crown on it. His face had a brown stain on the cheek when he looked up at Dean with a smirk.

“Squirrel!” he shouted, and a moment later, he was hugging Dean’s leg.

“Okay, yeah, that’s enough now,” Dean said, trying to get the small demon away from him. “I’m glad to see you too and all.”

“You didn’t comed to my birthday,” Crowley demanded in a Scottish accent that was somehow even thicker than when he was grown, narrowing his malicious little brown eyes at him.

“We didn’t… get the invitation,” Dean lied, through gritted teeth. They had actually got it, and Sam had suggested they should send a present, but then the damned thing had got “misplaced”, which was a softer way of saying Meg had probably thrown it in a fire.

“Isn’t he handsome?” Rowena said, leaning to run a hand through Crowley’s hair. “My little prince is growing so fast.”

“Yeah, sure,” Dean said. “Uh, what are you doing here?”

“What? Can’t I just drop by and visit you all?” Rowena shrugged.

Dean realized she wasn’t going to tell him exactly what she was doing there unless he invited her in. And he was already regretting as he said it.

Since that first Halloween four years before, Rowena hadn’t pulled that stunt of leaving Crowley with them for days on end again, but she was in the habit of showing up unannounced every few months, in the most unexpected moments, and dumping the little demon on them for hours at a time. She insisted it was because she had business to attend and she didn’t trust a nanny to take care of her precious Fergus the way he needed it, and she much rather have him stay with “family”. Dean suspected it was because she feared that whatever nanny she hired would end dead in the middle of the living room, and she couldn’t be bothered to remove the bloodstains. Meg was convinced she did it to personally mortify her.

Whatever the case, it seemed like Rowena was at it again. She put an enormous white beach bag on the library’s table, probably filled with things to blackmail the Winchesters into babysitting for Crowley again and looked around the bunker.

“Love what you’ve done with the place,” she said, her cheery tone sounded as forced as it could be. “It looks so… rustic and decadent.”

“It looks exactly the same as the last time you were here.”

“Kitten!” Crowley shouted upon seeing _Mr. Whiskers_. The cat immediately started running for his life and disappeared among the shelves, because it wouldn’t be the first time Crowley’s eager chubby fingers jeopardized the integrity of his tail.

Dean let out a long, resigned sigh. “Okay, just spit it out. How long you need us to take care of the little devil for you?”

“Oh, Dean,” Rowena sighed and clicked her tongue. “Who do you take me for? I know I have made mistakes in the past, but I believe I have done enough to prove to you that I have mended my ways.”

Dean remained unconvinced, but what could he really say? He wished Sam was there, he knew how to deal with Rowena.

“This is not a babysitting call,” Rowena insisted. “It’s not!” she added when Dean showed her his most skeptic face.

“Hey, Dean?” Sam called, getting inside the library with a sweatpants and no shirt. “I thought I saw… oh,” Sam stopped in his tracks when Rowena happily waved at him. “So I did see Crowley chasing one of the cats.”

“Yeah. Rowena here was just telling me how she does _not_ expect us to look after Crowley,” Dean groaned.

“Oh, really?” Sam crooked an eyebrow, looking every bit as disbelieving as his brother. “So why are you here?”

“I was just getting to that,” Rowena smiled, so wide and so happily the brothers couldn’t help but to shudder. “We’re here on vacation!”

She extended her arms, obviously half-expecting the Winchesters to hug her or show some other kind of exalted emotion at that announcement. They both just stared at her, without even trying to hide their astonishment.

“I’m sorry, come again?”

“Yes!” Rowena said, not at all taken aback by the lack of reaction. “I figured, you boys have done so much for me, and Fergus really loves you both. And I know your little ones are not so little anymore and soon they will be leaving the nest, so I figure, why not spend a fun summer, all of us, together, before that happens?”

“There’s like a million reasons why not to!” Dean shouted.

“Did you say a whole summer?” Sam asked, his eyes opening wide. “You plan to spend the entire summer, here?”

“Oh, I knew you’d be delighted!” Rowena said, either ignoring the Winchesters’ expressions or simply being her usual, pushy, sarcastic self. “Well, I will go find me a room now. Oh, and Fergus and I haven’t had breakfast, so if you’d be so kind to make us some? I like my coffee black, no sugar, and Fergus likes Cheerios. You do have those, don’t you?”

“Rowena…”

The witch simply strutted away, not bothering to answer. Sam and Dean exchanged looks, like they wanted to make sure the other had seen and heard all of that too.

“What is her angle?” Dean spoke first. “She definitely has an angle.”

“Dean, she can’t stay here,” Sam said, shaking his head. “Do you imagine what will happen when Meg…?”

He didn’t have to go any further. At that very moment, Meg discovered the presence of the little intruder in the house and let out a furious roar that was probably heard from miles around. A second later, she was in the library, barefoot and wearing unbuttoned jeans, carrying a reddening Crowley by the neck.

“What is this little plague doing here?!” she demanded to know, holding him at arm’s length like he stunk.

Despite being apparently choking, Crowley swung his little feet around, and was apparently trying to hug Meg somehow.

“Whore!” he shouted, enthusiastically, like he was actually happy to see her.

“You dare, you smarmy little…”

“Meg, put it down,” Dean ordered. “He’s leaving soon.”

“He better be!” Meg groaned. “He barged into my room while I was changing, like he owned the place!”

She practically tossed Crowley over the table, but the demon boy landed on his feet laughing, like it was all a game to him. He stood up and ran towards Meg screaming: “Again!” Meg put a hand over his forehead to keep him away from her.

“Where is Rowena?” she asked. “Don’t tell me she left already, because I have a couple of things to say to her!”

“Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’m right here,” Rowena sang, reappearing without her white bag, which made the brothers feared she might have already found a room. “My, but you have really grown!” she added, putting a hand on the top of Meg’s head. The demon was tall enough to reach Rowena’s shoulder, and they would probably have been the same height had Rowena not been wearing heels as usual. “Look at you, you’re certainly becoming a young little lady…”

“Yeah, a young little lady,” Meg groaned, glaring at the witch with pure hate burning in her eyes. “And all that implies.”

It took Rowena about a second to get what Meg was saying.

“Oh, I’m sorry, but the spell is a little unpredictable in its consequences,” she said, shrugging. “It looks like a gift that keeps on giving, isn’t it? If it’s too bad, I can prepare you a herb mix to help you with that. Of course, some of them have hallucinatory effects sometimes…”

“You’re not giving her drugs!” Sam determined.

Meg puffed something that sounded a lot like “killjoy” and picked up Crowley to hand him to his mother.

“Here,” she groaned. “Take him and get the hell out.”

“Oh, but hadn’t they told you?” Rowena asked, all fake innocence and happiness. “Fergus and I are vacationing here!”

“You’re what?” Meg asked.

Her face went from angry demonic teenage princess to serial killer planning her next hit. To other people the change might have been subtle, but Sam was pretty used to Meg’s expressions by then and he knew that unless he removed her from there at that very moment, the situation was likely to end in a bloodbath.

“Okay, Meg,” he said, grabbing her by the shoulder. “Why don’t you and I go check on the… thing?”

Meg didn’t move an inch.

“If you think you’re staying in _my_ house…”

“Woah, since when this is _your_ house?” Dean asked.

“What’s going on?” Castiel asked, popping his head in the library.

“Feathers!” Crowley greeted enthusiastically, extending his arms towards the angel.

“Well, isn’t this nice?” Rowena said, putting her son down, who promptly ran to hug Castiel. “Now we’re all together! Where are we on that coffee, dears?”

 

* * *

 

In their favor, it had to be said they tried getting rid of Rowena. That very same evening, while she was busy bathing Crowley, the four occupants of the bunker got together in the War Room to discuss the topic.

“I say we put iron shackles on them both and throw them in the river,” Meg proposed, direct as always.

Castiel, who for some reason thought it’d be a good idea to write what they talked about there down, scribbled that in his block of notes.

“That’s too complicated,” Sam said. “And besides, do you really think Rowena will go down without a fight?”

Castiel stroke the motion in one single, sharp movement.

“I still think she’s working an angle here,” Dean replied. “Maybe if we find out what she wants and just give it to her, she’ll go away and leave us alone.”

“It’s never that simple with Rowena,” Sam sighed. “And besides, what if what she wants is something dangerous? She is a powerful witch; we can’t have her running around with Men of Letters’ knowledge.”

Castiel stroke out that idea too.

“Maybe… and this is just an idea,” the angel said. “We could kindly ask her to leave.”

“We’ve done that.”

“I said _kindly_ ,” Castiel repeated. “And with some sort of excuse, like we’re remodeling the rooms and she can’t stay there.”

The Winchesters and Meg looked at each other, and then collectively shook their heads.

“She’s not going to take the hint,” Sam said. “Or maybe she will, but she’s going to ignore it.”

“So maybe we don’t ask kindly,” Meg said, her eyes lighting up with the manic glimmer she got when she started making an evil plan. “Maybe what we need is an all out attack. We make this place unlivable and send them running for the hills.”

Cas tapped his notes with the pen, like he wasn’t sure he should write that down. The Winchesters were hesitant as always to follow a plan Meg, of all people, had suggested, but it was obvious they weren’t coming up with anything better.

“Alright, we can do that,” Dean said in the end. “Operation Let’s Kick The Witch Out.”

“I think we need a better name,” Castiel pointed out.

A little squeal of joy interrupted the meeting. They all turned around to see Crowley running inside with his underpants on the head and nothing else. He stood on a chair, happily naked, and started shaking his butt for everybody to see. Meg made a strangled noise of disgust and covered her eyes. The others would have laughed, but they were all a too stunned to really react.

“Crowley, what the hell…” Dean managed to say before Rowena ran in with a towel in her hands and thankfully wrapped her son in it.

“Oh, come here, you little goofball!” she said, picking him up. “Oh, I’m sorry, I hope we didn’t interrupt anything important. Look at you, sitting there all serious… what are you guys up to?”

She offered them a shit-eating grin, that made Sam suspect she wasn’t as oblivious to the effect her presence had there as she pretended to be.

“We’re just making plans to do for the summer,” Castiel said, coming up with a lie so fast Meg probably felt proud. “You know, places to go, persons to meet… we want you to have a good time.”

His eyes were so big and his smile was so innocent even Rowena had a hard time doubting his sincerity.

“Really?” she asked, crooking a brow.

“Of course,” Castiel said, with his warmest tone. “You’re our guests.”


	9. Contact

They didn’t let Meg plan the first activities to kick Rowena out, because the plan required subtlety, and she was anything but.

“I can be subtle!” Meg protested.

“You do remember that time you murdered Pastor Jim to send us a message?” Sam reminded her. “That was anything but!”

Meg crossed her arms and leaned back on the chair, huffing.

“You kill _one_ priest, and they never let you live it down,” she commented, resentfully.

“Well, I don’t know if Rowena trusts us, but for some reason she believes you, Cas,” Dean pointed out. “So I think you should choose what to do first.”

“Okay,” Castiel said, as serious as if he had just been confided the most crucial part of a mission. “I’m going to need camping supplies.”

The following day, Rowena was woken up at the crack of dawn but a very insistent angel poking her on the shoulder.

“Child, I am almost four hundred years old,” she complained, after rubbing her eyes and throwing a murderous glare at Castiel. “Beauty sleep is not an option.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Castiel said, blinking all wide-eyed and angelic. “I was just thinking you and Crowley would like to come on our hiking expedition.”

“Hiking expedition?” Rowena repeated, frowning.

“Yes, we’ve been planning it for months!” Castiel said, even though they had got they had literally come up with it less than twelve hours prior. “Sam and Dean wanted to go into the woods to check out the traps that keep the bunker protected, and we thought you might want to come along to pick up your herbs and such.”

“I’m not leaving Fergus alone with Meg,” Rowena said, laying down again and pulling the covers over her head. “You can run along now.”

“Oh, but Meg is coming too,” Castiel explained. “And I’m sure Crow… I mean, Fergus is going to love being outdoors and seeing some animals…”

“Yes, sure,” Rowena said, and a little smirk of disbelief appeared on her sleepy face. “Good luck waking him up.”

Castiel didn’t need luck, in fact, because Rowena hadn’t even finished saying that when the door of her room burst open and Crowley bounced inside wearing a pair of khaki shorts, sneakers and a cap.

“Excursion!” he shouted, as he jumped on the bed next to Rowena and started shaking her. “Momma, let’s go! We’re going to woods!”

“What do you say, Rowena?” Dean asked to the now brusquely awake witch. “I think oxygen will be good for him.”

Rowena relented to her son’s enthusiasm (not without a couple of groans and protests), and half an hour later, she was trotting miserable behind the Winchesters, who took long confident strides between the trees like they actually knew where they were going. Meg and Castiel had no problem keeping up with them, and even Crowley, with his short legs, managed to stay by their side.

“Momma, hurry!” he stopped to scream once in a while. “Hurry, we’re _leaved_ behind!”

“Yes, you could say so,” Rowena groaned, shaking the leaves and twig that continuously got caught in her long red hair. “Couldn’t we have taken an easier trail?”

“Couldn’t you have put on more sensible shoes?” Sam replied, pointing at the heeled boots Rowena had chosen for the excursion.

“I will not be caught dead in those ugly, shapeless things you bought for me,” Rowena replied, meaning the sneakers that Castiel had somehow managed to get for her. “Not that I don’t appreciate the intention,” she added, softening her tone.

“We’re glad to hear that,” Dean replied, as he turned the map around. “Hey, Sam, do you recognize any of these things?”

“Are we lost?” Meg asked, narrowing her eyes at the hunter.

“No, of course not,” Sam said, after taking a look at the map and turned it around again. “We’re just… not exactly sure which direction we’re going.”

“We’re fucking lost,” Meg sighed.

“Language!” Rowena shouted, scandalized, as she covered Crowley’s ears.

The little demon, however, was too busy to pay attention to what Meg said. He had picked up a rod two miles back and was too busy plucking the leaves from it to pay attention.

“Let me see that,” Castiel asked, taking the map from the brothers. “I don’t think we’re lost,” he added, after a few seconds of analyzing it. “We only need to find the stream.”

As if that was the signal he had been waiting for, Crowley lifted the rod and started walking into a seemingly random direction.

“Fergus, where are you going?” Rowena called him with a little note of hysterics in her voice. “Fergus!” she shouted when Crowley disappeared from her sight. She ran behind them, while the Winchesters exchanged looks.

“Idea,” Meg said, raising a finger. “We go back to the bunker and just leave them here.”

“We can’t do that,” Dean said, but the little pause between Meg’s proposal and him speaking indicated he had considered the idea for a second. “We don’t want Rowena to be the new Blair Witch.”

“You do realize the Blair Witch was fiction, right?”

That was not really the point Dean was trying to make, but it didn’t matter. They all started running behind the witch and her son, who, luckily, had not gone far. Crowley was practically tumbling on his thick legs as he walked down the path, while Rowena, that had looked so worried not five minutes before, just stared at him very attentively.

“What are you…?”

Rowena hushed them as Crowley continued his way forwards. A few steps later, the small devil pushed a bush aside to reveal a stream of clear waters running behind it. He stood there with a proud beam in his face at the same time Rowena squealed with happiness.

“His first dowsing!” she exclaimed as she ran towards him and lifted him in the air. “Oh, I’m so, so proud of you!” she said, as she covered him in kisses and Crowley tried to get away from her apparently constricting hug. “Wasn’t he great?” Rowena asked, turning to the others.

“Yeah, great, yay, super,” the Winchesters and his little monsters answered in a not very enthusiastic chorus, but Rowena didn’t perceived the sarcasm in his voices.

“Now we can find our way back, right?” she said, pointing at the stream. “And all thanks to my Fergus…”

Thanks to her Fergus, they also had to stop by a pharmacy on the way back, because it turned out the bush he had pushed out of the way was poisonous. Crowley kept weeping softly as Rowena applied aloe cream on the ugly red rash on his arms.

“This comes with the territory of being a great witch, Fergus,” she educated him as she went. “You will be bitten, poisoned and possibly burned in more occasions that you can count. You need to learn to work through it. It’s the only way to build character.”

Crowley nodded through tearful eyes.

“We’re sorry it ended this way, Rowena…”

“Oh, but there’s nothing to be sorry about!” Rowena said, with her eyes lightening up. “Fergus learned so much! This was actually a great idea!”

And she smirked at Sam, all gratitude and happiness.

“I can’t wait to see what else you have in store for us!”

So five minutes later, while Rowena put Crowley to bed, they were back in the War Room.

“If you’re about to suggest some form of murder, we’ve already told you we can’t do that,” Dean said the moment Meg opened her mouth.

“You didn’t even hear what kind of murder I had in mind!” she protested.

“How about you don’t murder them?” Sam suggested. “How about you just make this house a little less… welcoming?”

Meg caressed her chin as if she was lost in deep thoughts.

“Sure, I can do that,” she said in the end. “But you’re not going to ground me afterwards?”

“You have our full permission,” Dean said, knowing all too well that he would live to regret it.

So during the following three days, doors came out of their hinges, clothes disappeared from the washing room and reappeared in the most inconvenient places, the water changed temperature whenever someone was in the bathroom, so it was always either ice cold or scalding hot.

“Boys, this place is falling apart,” Rowena complained to them. “How can you even live like this?”

“Trust me, we wonder the same thing,” Dean said. “More stew?”

Rowena’s lips twitched in disgust. Dean’s food had definitely decreased in quality: it was always either too salty, or too watery, or simply too disgusting. He seemed to add ingredients at random, with invariably terrible results. Meg and Castiel ate it (or pretended to eat it) without flinching, and Crowley most likely ended up throwing it at the cats or at the walls, but Sam and Rowena were starving at the end of every meal.

“I think something is wrong with your brother,” Rowena once told the younger Winchester after a breakfast that had consisted in a coffee that was too bitter, even for her, and some burnt toast with a thick and pale homemade jam on top of them.

“He’s just going to one of his experimental phases,” Sam said, shrugging. “It’ll pass, I promise.”

The tipping point was probably one night, while they were all trying a pizza with avocados on top, and the lights suddenly went out. It wasn’t strange that one or two light bulbs exploded now and then (Castiel had an electric charge about him that made him incompatible with electronics when he was in a mood), but by the ways the red emergency lights turned on, it was obvious the blackout was in the entire bunker.

“What the…?” Dean said, and immediately lowered his eyes at Meg, who was happily chewing the pizza like she couldn’t even taste it.

“It’s alright!” Castiel said, practically jumping off his chair with too much joy in his eyes. “I have been preparing for situations like this.”

“How exactly…?” Sam began to ask, but Castiel had already bolted in his room’s direction.

Two seconds later, there was a loud noise of something heavy and hard crashing on the floor.

“Cas, are you okay?” Dean asked.

There was no answer.

“You think he died?” Meg asked, turning to Sam with eyes wide open.

“How very inconvenient that would be,” Rowena commented.

Castiel had, in fact, not died, but received an ugly hit in the face by a wooden box he was now carrying with far less joy he’d felt two seconds before.

“Here,” he said putting the box in the middle of the table as he rubbed his head. “There’s glow sticks, and lanterns and…”

“Candles!” Rowena said, delighted, pulling two big white ones out. “Oh, we make this into a séance!”

“You know, _invoking_ spirits is kind of the opposite of our job description,” Dean pointed out.

“Also, it’s a bad idea,” Sam said. “The place is plagued with magical energy. We don’t know what could happen…”

“Oh, come on, Sammy,” Rowena said, rolling her eyes. “Communicating with the spirit world is always fun. They make the best afterlife jokes.”

“Tell you what,” Dean said, standing up. “You stay here and… do you, while we go check on the fuses.”

“Killjoys,” Rowena muttered under her breath as the Winchesters left for the electronic room armed with only their flashlights. She turned to Meg and Castiel with her usual grin. “And how about you?”

“You heard what Sam said, it could…”

“Do you think you can connect with dead demons?” Meg cut Castiel off. The angel looked at her with a frown on his face, thinking it might be another one of her pranks, but her face looked deadly serious in the dim light of the glow sticks. “Just asking,” she added when a few seconds of silent went by.

“Well, I’ve never tried,” Rowena admitted, caressing her chin, pensively. “The truth is, I’m not even sure what should I be connecting with to when trying to call a demonic spirit… I mean, where creatures like angels and demons go when they are killed remains a big mystery…”

“Yeah, okay, I get that,” Meg rolled her eyes, obviously not impressed by Rowena’s babbling. “But _can_ you do it? Aren’t you the most powerful witch ever?”

Rowena shrugged, but it was clear she felt flattered by Meg’s words. Castiel didn’t want to say that the title of ‘most powerful witch ever’ sounded like it had been self-appointed.

“Oh, very well,” Rowena said. “If you never try, you’ll never know, right?”

So a few minutes later, they had light up five candles and placed them over the floor, forming an improvised pentagram. Rowena produced some crystal stones and put them in the middle of the candles, while she instructed Meg and Castiel to sit by her side and hold hands.

“Now, don’t let go of your partner under any circumstances until I say it’s safe to do so,” she ordered them. “It may be dangerous to do otherwise since it’s very likely the spirits we’re trying to connect with here are angry and will try to take possession of you…”

“You’re kidding me, right?” Meg said, crooking an eyebrow.

Rowena looked at them like she had forgotten what they were for a moment.

“I said _try_ ,” she concluded. “And they might get violent if they find they can’t do it, so we really need to be careful. Are you ready?”

“I still think we shouldn’t…” Castiel began protesting.

“Close your eyes and take a deep breath,” Rowena indicated, completely ignoring the angel. Her voice adopted a calm and rhythmic cadence as she continued: “Empty your minds and open them to the possibility of the unknown. We’re trying to connect with a soul that has been damaged and thrown into the fiery pits of the infernal realm and then destroyed when it tried to walk the Earth again. We’re trying to contact…” she stopped and opened one eye to glance at Meg. “I’m sorry, who are we trying to contact again?” she inquired, her voice recovering its usual tone.

“Azazel,” Meg clarified in a whisper.

“We’re trying to connect with Azazel, servant of Lucifer and former King of Hell,” Rowena said, adopting again the mystical tone of voice she had a second ago. “Azazel, the Yellow-Eyed Demon…”

“Hold on, no, that’s a bad idea,” Meg interrupted her, cringing. “I don’t want him to see me like this. Dating an angel and living with hunters. He’s going to be furious!”

“We’re dating?” Castiel asked, looking at her wide-eyed. He had always assumed Meg and him had a relationship of sorts going on, but she had never defined in such explicit terms, and now that he did, he could feel his heart pounding fast in his chest and his palms sweating, because that was the closest Meg had come to ever admit…

“Well, then, who do you want us to contact?” Rowena asked, obviously not happy about that change of plans.

“How about my brother Tom?” Meg suggested. “We were tight in Hell, I’m sure he’ll respond if I call him.”

“Alright,” Rowena sighed. “We’re trying to contact Tom… did he go by any other names? That sounds a little too general.”

“Clarence, your hand is getting all wet.”

“Sorry,” Castiel rubbed his palm on his jeans and then extended towards Meg again, with a shy smile. She didn’t seem to be aware of what she had said and the effect it had on him, because she simply grabbed it and turned his attention back to Rowena.

“Just Tom,” she said.

“Very well,” Rowena said, and closed her eyes again. “We’re calling on to Tom…”

“Although the bastard did shoot me once,” Meg remembered suddenly.

Rowena huffed and let go off both their hands.

“How am I expected to accomplish the impossible if you keep interrupting me?” she complained, standing up. “I give up. You obviously lack the discipline for…”

A loud thud cut off her speech. The three of them went quiet and very still for a second. The thud came again, louder and more insistent this time.

“Dad?” Meg asked, with her eyes popping out.

“Hold hands, hold hands now!” Rowena shouted, as she sat back down in the improvised circle. “Oh, spirit of who was once a powerful demon, we beg you to…!”

The light bulb on top of their heads flashed, and then turned on, totally killing the atmosphere. Meg and Castiel exchanged a confused look, until the thud came again from somewhere behind them. When they looked at the table, they saw Crowley standing there, hitting a plastic plate against the table and laughing at the sound. His face was covered in green from eating the rest of the avocado pizza that had been abandoned when the blackout came.

“Of course,” Meg sighed softly.

“Fergus, what are you doing out of bed?” Rowena scolded him, going towards him and trying to snatch the plate from his hands. “You know if you don’t get your twelve hours of sleep you get cranky. Give to momma, come on…”

“There we are,” Dean said, reemerging followed by Sam. “It was apparently just an overcharge. We put the generators to work… what were you guys doing in here?” he added, eyeing the candles and the stones on the floor.

“Meg and I are dating!” Castiel shouted, unable to contain his excitement.

“Yeah,” Sam chuckled. “We kind of have figured that out…”

“Did you?” Castiel asked, tilting his head.

“Oh, shut up, Clarence,” Meg rolled her eyes.

Then, when everyone got busy doing things other than looking at them, she kissed him on the cheek.


	10. Calculated

“I swear, Peggy, I cannot wait for them to go away,” Meg huffed.

They were hanging out in the lounge chairs around the public swimming pool, in their bathing suits (Meg had a violet bikini, while Peggy wore an old-fashioned blue one piece) watching as kids and adults alike floated in the water or ran around the edge, only to be told off by the lifeguard to cut it out. That worked for about ten minutes until they started again.

Luckily, the pool was full enough that it justified staying open late, but not so full that swimmers knocked heads every other minute. The day was so warm that it certainly should have been fuller, but half of the assistants had suddenly decided to go home for unexplained reasons the moment Meg had set a foot on the complex.

“They can’t be that bad,” Peggy said, although she knew that whenever she said that it was an invitation for Meg to start listing all the reasons why the thing they were talking about was indeed the worst thing ever. “I mean your cousin is pretty cute.”

Crowley was currently wading around on the kid’s pool with goggles over his head, shaking his floaties in a pathetic imitation of swimming, while Rowena stood aside with a group of other worried mothers who watched their kids like hawks. Every once in a while they could hear them shouting instructions at them: “Emma, don’t go that far!” or “Timmy, don’t put your head underwater!” or “Fergus, stop kicking that girl!”

“Yeah, just wait for him to come at you with a fucking blade in hand,” Meg groaned under her breath.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Hey, girls,” Gary greeted them. He was working there for the summer. First he had tried out for the lifeguard place, but his asthma didn’t really make him a good swimmer, so now he was wearing a vest and a bowtie and black slacks, even thought it was hot as hell, and Meg should know. “Another drink on the house?” he invited them, as he put the empty next to them back on his platter.

“Gary, if you keep bringing us free things, they will fire you,” Peggy pointed out. “You can make every drink on the house!”

“Oh, come on, let the boy be happy,” Meg said. “It makes you happy to bring us free drinks, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, and don’t worry about it,” Gary shrugged. “I have me methods.”

He left without explaining what they were. Meg liked Gary. She had discovered that underneath his asthmatic, socially awkward exterior, there actually laid a bit of an evil genius, and she was willing to help him cultivate those qualities.

“You want to impress Peggy, don’t you?” she would whisper in his ear sometimes. “Then this is what you need to do.”

She had actually been the one to convince him to get the job because it “showed initiative and care for his future.” Her underlying motive was that she wanted to get a discount on the pool’s fee and free things, and so far it was working out just fine for her.

Except for the fact that she had made the mistake to tell Castiel that Gary had invited them to the pool within earshot of Rowena, who decided to “improve” the excursion by making it a “family day out”. It didn’t matter how much they insisted they were the furthest thing away from family, she still introduced herself as their “aunt” and Crowley as their “cousin”, visiting from Scotland. It was like whatever they said to her fell on stubbornly deaf ears.

In any case, Meg was not willing to let them ruin her perfect summer day. The sun was shining in the sky, the fruity drinks Gary kept bringing them were just on the right side of sweet, and Castiel kept doing laps in the pool. If she narrowed her eyes, Meg could almost make out the outline of his growing wings, shining under the sunlight.

Almost as if the angel had sense her eyes on him, he stopped near the stairs at the deep end of the pool, and climbed out, water dripping from his hair all the way down his body. Meg bit the straw of her drink. These hormonal changes were really starting to get to her.

“Hello, Castiel,” Peggy said.

“Drink?” Gary offered him, pointing at the last glass of juice left on his platter.

“Thank you, but I don’t think I have brought enough money…”

“On the house,” Gary insisted, putting in Castiel’s hand and walking away before he could protest any further.

“You know, I don’t believe this is a sound business model,” Castiel commented, but he started slurping his juice anyway. Meg scooted a little so he could sit in the same chair with her, their shoulders grazing slightly.

“How are you liking the day, Clarence?” she asked, with a smile in her face.

“I never did imagine that swimming could be so… soothing,” Castiel admitted. “And Sam and Dean seem to be enjoying it as well.”

The Winchesters were on the other side of the pool, because Meg had said that she didn’t want to look like a loser by having them sit too close. They were both wearing shorts and, for reasons that were beyond her, Hawaiian shirts (As far as she knew, they had never in their lives or reincarnations been to Hawaii), and were basking in the sun with beers in their hands. Although the sunglasses hid it, Meg was willing to bet they were both taking a deep, relaxed nap, and if they were close enough, she probably would have heard them snoring softly.

“Well, at least someone is relaxed,” Meg commented calmly.

“Fergus! Stop that right now!” Rowena’s hysterical voice reached them.

Crowley, not paying a single ounce of attention to his mother, was running around the deep end of the pool, happily dancing on the edge of it and more than definitely threatening to jump. Meg wasn’t really that concerned, because he still had his ridiculous floaties in his arms. And besides, if the little bastard drowned, she didn’t think it would be that much of a loss for the world.

“Lady, control your son!” shouted the lifeguard, stopping his chatting with a bronzed girl wearing a blank bikini.

“Fergus, I demand you come here right this minute!” Rowena continued shouting, even though that technique didn’t seem to be working that great for her. “No, don’t climb up there, that’s for the bigger boys! Fergus, I’m warning you!”

Her shouting was finally loud enough to disturb the Winchesters. Sam lifted his head, and elbowed his brother in the ribs. Dean jerked awake, sitting up on the chair suddenly and looking around for possible dangers until Sam pointed at Crowley. The little demon was climbing on the trampoline, and giving little jumps with a goofy grin in his face, almost as if he was testing the terrain. Dean shrugged, as if to indicate that was none of their business, and promptly relaxed in his chair again.

“Fergus!” Rowena kept screaming. Her tone was more scared than furious now, and she obviously didn’t dare to climb on the trampoline after her son, lest he would jump. “You need to…!”

Crowley jumped to the pool.

Although, to be fair, it was more like he stumbled in it: one second he was making little bunny hops, the next second he had run out of trampoline. His chubby body made a surprisingly small splash. What followed was a second of absolute silence in which everyone present held their breath, waiting for Crowley’s head to pop up again, held on by his relatable floaties.

The floaties came back up. Crowley didn’t.

Rowena screamed in a high pitch, desperate tone, and the lifeguard was already running towards the pool when there was a second splash nobody was expecting.

Another entire second went by, and then Meg from the waters, holding a coughing Crowley by the neck.

“Fergus!” Rowena shouted, tending her arms towards him. Meg practically tossed him at her when she climbed out of the pool.

“Be more careful!” she shouted, without specifying if she meant Crowley or Rowena. “Put it on a leash, will you?”

In any case, they both started crying at the same time: Rowena holding her son so tight it was a miracle she didn’t choke him, and Crowley with the scared sobbing of a kid who had no idea what had just happened, but still understood he had been saved by a whisker.

“What the hell was that?” Gary asked, as Meg made her way back to them ignoring all the people gawking at her. “How did you run there so fast? Did you see that?” he added, turning to Peggy. “That was not possible!”

Peggy, who was pretty used to seeing impossible things happen around Meg and Castiel at that point in her life, simply shrugged it off.

“Don’t you want to check on your cousin?” she asked.

“Why? The little bastard’s alive, isn’t he?” Meg replied, with a shrug, as she reached for a towel and calmly started drying her hair. “I’ve done more than enough for him.”

“There was absolutely no way you could have got there that fast!” Gary kept protesting. “It doesn’t make any sense! You were here, and then you were jumping and…”

“Gary, I think you’ve spent too much time in the sun,” Meg said, as she leaned on her chair again next to Castiel. “Take a break, won’t you?”

Gary seemed to want to keep demanding an explanation, but then Peggy grabbed his hand and it was like all the air was sucked out of him.

“Let’s go inside,” Peggy proposed. “And you can show me how you do the juices, yes?”

Gary obediently went with her.

“What?” Meg asked Castiel.

“Nothing,” he said, but he kept smiling smugly for so long Meg felt the impulse to slap him.

“Come on, tell me,” she demanded instead.

“You did a good thing,” Castiel pointed out.

Meg looked again at were Rowena and Crowley were standing. The Winchesters had joined them, and they were all talking to the lifeguard, who seemed to be making sure no one was going to sue him or the pool.

“It wasn’t a good thing,” she explained, slightly irritated. “It was a carefully calculated move! I thought it’d be necessary for the bastard and his mother to owe me something. I saw a chance and I took”

“Of course,” Castiel nodded, calmly.

“And besides, if he had drowned, it would have ruined our day,” Meg kept explaining, while Castiel’s beatific disbelief enraged her even more. “Stop it, Castiel! I don’t do good things for the sake of it! That’s what _you_ do, remember?”

“Yes, absolutely,” Castiel said, passing an arm around her shoulders.

Meg was seriously considering throwing him inside the pool and holding him underwater to prove to him how good she was _not_ , when the Winchesters approached them.

“So, we have to go,” Sam said.

“What?” Meg and Castiel asked at the same time.

“Yeah, it turns out you’re not allowed to manhandle other people’s kids,” Dean explained.

“I was saving his miserable life!” Meg said, loud enough that other swimmers turned their heads towards them. She glared in the lifeguard’s direction, who was looking down at his flip flops in shame.

“That sounds like a ridiculously specific rule,” Castiel pointed out.

“What can I tell you? They’ll make up all sort of rules if enough soccer moms complain,” Dean sighed. “And also, you’re not allowed to sit in the same chair like that. If we don’t leave now, they’re going to ban us.”

Meg’s face went red, and Sam predicted she was about to go into a screaming fit. Instead, she just took a deep breath and shook her head, the live image of consternation.

“For the record,” she groaned. “It’s the last time I do something _good_.”

The proceeded to pick up their stuff (their towels, their bags, their clothes) exasperatingly slow, and after they’d said goodbye to Peggy and Gary, Meg still found the time to throw a dirty look in the lifeguard’s direction. Which wasn’t entirely necessary, since Rowena was still shouting at him.

“If you have done your job, my son would have been safe!” she was shouting, disregarding the fact that she was the one who couldn’t hold him in place. “And my niece wouldn’t have to have jumped and break your stupid and completely irrational rules.”

The poor boy looked like he was getting the scolding of a lifetime, with his face red with embarrassment and his eyes moving everywhere, probably looking for a getaway road.

“I’m sorry, miss, but the…”

“No, you listen to me, young man,” Rowena said, jabbing a finger in the lifeguard’s chest. “I will not allow you to treat our family like that. We’re going to leave now, because Fergus is scared, but we’re going to be back no matter how many bans you _dare_ to put on us. And if you try to stop us, I’m going to have your job, am I making myself clear?”

“Crystal clear,” the lifeguard said, swallowing loudly.

“Okay, Aunt Rowena,” Dean said, delicately putting a hand on Rowena’s shoulder to get her out of the place. “I think that’s quite enough.”

Rowena still took some seconds to glare at the lifeguard. Crowley, who was holding on to her long and looked pretty not scared by the entire ordeal, stuck his tongue between his lips and blew a loud raspberry at him. After they were both done humiliating the poor kid, they turned around and followed the Winchesters outside the complex.

“I gotta be honest,” Dean commented. “For a second there I thought you were going to curse the shit out of the kid.”

“I thought about it,” Rowena confessed.

“Well, that’s just great,” Meg groaned. “What are we supposed to do with the rest of…?”

Her voice trailed off. Someone was pulling her by the shirt. For a second, she thought it was Castiel telling her to wait in the most childish manner, but when she looked down, she saw Crowley holding onto the edge of her clothes, with a beam in his round little face.

“Whore!” he said, happily.

“Oh, no,” Meg said, snatching the shirt from Crowley. “No, no, get away from me!”

Crowley didn’t pay attention: he extended his arms towards Meg, clearly trying to hug her. Meg put a hand on his forehead and held him at arm’s length with a disgusted expression in her face.

“What is it, Meg?” Castiel asked, with an amused smirk. “Was this not part of your calculations?”

“I should have let it drown,” she muttered with a grimace.


	11. Feud

If somebody had told him six years ago that he would be preparing a barbecue on a hill near his own home for a Fourth of July, Dean would had probably laughed and said that would be really something. If somebody had told him he would be doing said thing with his brother, his adoptive sister, a witch (and waiting for another) and an angel and two demons who’d had their ages reverted, Dean would had… probably believed it, but hoped that would never happened.

And now there he was: roasting burgers in his second hand red grill that had been a birthday present, listening to Sam trying to stop Rowena and Charlie from fighting about where to install the picnic tablecloth and making sure Castiel was making Meg refrain from killing Crowley, who kept latching onto Meg and calling her “whore” as if it was a term of endearment.

And it really wasn’t as terrible as Dean had imagined it.

“This way we can be facing the town,” Charlie was explaining to Rowena with an exasperated tone. “And we can have a better view of the fireworks.”

“But that way, the wind will be blowing in our direction,” Rowena argued. “We’ll have leaves and all sort of things crashing in our faces.”

“Aren’t witches supposed to be nature lovers or something?” Charlie groaned. “Like picking up herbs in the early morning and living in little cabins in the woods?”

“That’s nothing but a stereotype,” Rowena protested. “And it offends me that you would use it against me.”

“Come on, Cas, just a little bit,” Meg was begging, at the same time she tried to get away from Crowley’s decided hug. “Just so he will get scared and leave me alone.”

“You are not burning him on purpose Meg,” Castiel said.

“Okay, but what if I do it accidentally?”

Dean put the burgers on the grill, humming to himself and ignoring the chaos around them.

“Well, hello, everybody,” Mrs. Periwinkle greeted. She was carrying a small basket and she was leaning on _Pericles’_ arm, who was walking in his human form all formal and uptight. “I’m sorry if I’m late.”

“No, not at all,” Sam said, clearly happy to something else other than watch Charlie and Rowena bicker. “Please, come on, have a sit. Hello, _Pericles_.”

“Young Master Winchester,” answered the familiar with his feline indifference.

“I’m really sorry,” Mrs. Periwinkle repeated as Sam approached with a lawn chair for her. “We came walking, and this old legs aren’t as agile as they used to be. Perhaps I shouldn’t have spent all morning in the woods picking up herbs.”

Charlie shot Rowena a triumphant look, and the redheaded witch just rolled her eyes at her before paying attention to the older one.

“Tabitha,” she said, in a tone of cold respect.

“Rowena,” Mrs. Periwinkle smiled as she sat down, purposefully facing the town like she knew that would irritate Rowena to no end. “How you’ve been, dear? How’s your little demon?”

“See for yourself,” Rowena pointed at Crowley. He was still extending his arms towards Meg, who continued to talk to Castiel like she hadn’t even noticed she was still holding him away from her. “He’s growing so fast, isn’t he?”

“Yes, you could say so,” Mrs. Periwinkle said without compromising. _Pericles_ opened her basket and took out a platter with a round pie, perfectly baked and still smoking, even though that was probably not humanly possible. Dean eyed it with hunger as he turned the burgers over on the grill.

“What do you mean?” Rowena asked, narrowing her eyes at the older witch.

Although that was probably a relative term, Dean thought. Witches counted with rejuvenating spells and lived very long lives. If Mrs. Periwinkle looked older than Rowena it was because she wanted to. It probably had nothing to with the real age of the two witches.

“Oh, nothing, nothing in particular,” Mrs. Periwinkle smiled. _Pericles_ put the pie down on the tablecloth and took out a ball of yarn and a pair of knitting needles he diligently passed to Mrs. Periwinkle. “Thank you, dear. That would be all for now.”

_Pericles_ retreated to his cat form and jumped on the lap of his mistress, where he closed his eyes with a purr of pleasure.

“You’re insinuating something, Tabitha,” Rowena insisted, irritated. “You better tell me what it is right this instant.”

Mrs. Periwinkle simply started counting the points from the sweater she was apparently making. Why the old lady kept knitting sweaters in the middle of the hottest summer in decades, it was something that escaped Dean. It must have been an old lady or witchy thing.

“Tabitha…” Rowena insisted, narrowing her eyes at her.

“You’ve always been ambitious, Rowie, dear,” Mrs. Periwinkle said, as she calmly started knitting. Charlie snorted at the “Rowie” nickname, and immediately went quiet when Rowena glared at her. “I daresay it’s a quality you’ve passed on to your son. But despite that, you never liked _attention_. You always preferred to be the power behind the throne.”

“Like you don’t,” Rowena groaned. “I’ve heard the rumors, you know. There was that ugly business of the prophecy you and your sisters offered to the King of Scotland.”

“Oh, please. That annoying scribbler exaggerated a lot of things,” Mrs. Periwinkle said. “We didn’t roam the moors waiting for passing travelers to offer them prophecies for kicks. The man came to us, he asked, we responded. It was as simple as that. We had nothing to do with what happened afterwards. And before you ask, it wasn’t us who cursed the play either.”

Dean raised his eyes from the grill and looked around. Charlie and Sam were staring at Mrs. Periwinkle, open-mouthed. The nerds obviously had an idea what the old witch was talking about. Even Castiel and Meg were looking at her, clearly impressed.

“But we were never power hungry,” Mrs. Periwinkle said, sticking her chin in the air proudly. “Unlike you, our only propose was to live our lives. You’ve caused many good men to fall, Rowena.”

“Why, thank you,” Rowena said, beaming like the other witch had just bestowed some sort of honorary title unto her. “I still don’t understand what that has to do with my son.”

“Oh, it’s quite simple, really,” Mrs. Periwinkle said, with a shrug. “You realized you couldn’t control him when he was what he was, so you decided to reset him and raise him again, this time to heed your every advice. That way, you could control Hell and all demons that grant other witches powers, and through them, you could remove or give power to the Borrowers that you approved of. The only witches that could oppose you then would be the Naturals, like you… or me.”

A heavy silence fell on the hill, interrupted only by the sizzling of the burgers over the grill. Mrs. Periwinkle offered Rowena a smile that was pure kindness, the type of smile a granny would offer their grandchildren after catching them committing some minor mischief. She still looked every bit like the old lady who could barely move, with her wrinkles and her white hair, but there was something right underneath the surface of her blue eyes that wasn’t quite as innocent. Like a heat boiling right underneath her skin, the way lava must boil underneath the surface of a volcano before it erupted.

Dean stopped paying attention to his burgers for a moment, observing the little inoffensive old lady sitting in the lawn chair, scratching her cat’s ears. He had never wondered exactly how powerful their friendly neighbor was, and now that he thought he was seeing a glimpse of it, he decided he would never in his life piss off Mrs. Periwinkle.

“Am I wrong?” she asked jovially.

Rowena looked livid: her lips were tightened and her hair was suddenly starting to rise with the static energy crackling all around her. Dean pondered if maybe he should have brought the iron shackles. The ambient up there on the hill had gone from festive to incredibly tense. Everybody (including Crowley) was staring alternatively at either witch, like they were deciding on which heavyweight boxer they should put their money on.

Finally, Rowena forced out a smile.

“And what about your ambitions, Tabitha?” she asked calmly. “You don’t think I haven’t heard about the Winter Solstice party – that you didn’t invite me to, by the way. Why now? You’ve been a recluse for centuries, and now you’re trying to gain your way back on the Grand Coven again?”

“Oh, I never really left my place in the Grand Coven,” Mrs. Periwinkle shrugged. “Just… took a long leave of absence. And they know I would always be back in case something went awry. Like your experimental spells, for example. Which I still doubt the motives you had to cast.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Tabitha,” she said, but her tone was anything but friendly. “As I’ve told many times to those who’ve asked, I just wanted a second chance with my son.”

“Of course, of course,” Mrs. Periwinkle nodded. “And that’s a very noble goal. It’s also very noble that you decided to get close to this… I wanna say, motley group of people and ethereal beings that somehow formed a family. After all, I’m sure it wasn’t in your plans to shrink the daughter of the former king.”

Rowena’s eyes fell on Meg for a fraction of a second before they returned to Mrs. Periwinkle.

“No, that was completely on accident,” she said.

“Oh, I’m sure it was,” Mrs. Periwinkle said. “I’m sure you’re trying to make the most of that situation as well. It’s in your nature, after all. What’s that saying about friends and enemies and where you should keep each? I always forget.”

Rowena clenched her fist so tight her knuckles went white, but apart from that, her usual grin remained in her face as usual. At the same time, Pericles stood on his four little paws. He didn’t hiss at Rowena, but his little ears were glued to his skull, and he stared at her intensely with his amber eyes.

“I’d be careful with what you’re about to do, Rowie,” Mrs. Periwinkle warned her, in a very soft tone that was nonetheless threatening. “We don’t want to ruin this beautiful evening now, do we?”

Rowena breathed in deeply, and then opened her hands. The static energy around them disappeared in thin air.

“Absolutely not,” Rowena replied. “What kind of guest would I be if I did that?”

Dean exchanged a look with Charlie and Sam, knowing perfectly well they had the same question in their minds: what the hell had just happened? Or better, what had _not_ happened?

“Excellent!” Mrs. Periwinkle exclaimed. “Dean, sweetie, will you be so kind to bring one of those burgers you’re cooking before they burn? I’m starving.”

“What? Oh, yes, of course,” Dean mumbled, grabbing the closest burger and putting it on a plate.

Rowena turned around and walked away to where Crowley was sitting, ripping leaves of grass and throwing them in the wind.

“Fergus, don’t do that,” she scolded him. “You’re going to stain your clothes.”

“I’m sorry, is everything okay?” Dean asked, as he leaned to give Mrs. Periwinkle her burger. “Because…”

“Oh, yes, dear, don’t worry about it,” their neighbor smiled. “Just an old feud between old witches, that’s old. Nothing that you should concern your pretty little head with.”

It was a little too late for that. Dean looked at Rowena, that now Crowley sitting on his lap, and then and Meg and Castiel, who were alternatively looking at either witch. Castiel had an arm around Meg’s shoulders, protectively, and when Meg turned to look at him, they started talking in hurried whispers in a language Dean didn’t recognize.

“You sure?” he insisted. “Because things got a little intense there for a second…”

“We have a flair for the dramatic,” Mrs. Periwinkle said, with a little shrug.

Dean decided to leave it alone. He went back to the grill and served two other burgers.

“Ah, thank you,” Rowena said, when he passed her a plate for her and another for Crowley. The little demon picked up his burger with glee in his eyes, and sank his teeth in it with a hum of pleasure. Rowena, on her side, stared at it with suspicion. “It doesn’t have any garlic, does it?”

“Thought you were a witch,” Dean pointed out. “Not a vampire.”

Rowena let out a half-hearted chuckle, and bit her burger without any further comments. Dean thought he saw little red half-moons in her palm.

Castiel and Meg kept murmuring when Dean approached them, but they went quiet as soon as they noticed him.

“What are you two on about?” the hunter asked, squinting at them.

“Nothing, what are you on about?” Meg snapped.

“Looming over people is creepy, Dean,” Castiel added, like he wasn’t the expert at doing exactly that.

So Dean just gave them their burgers and returned where Charlie and Sam were sitting.

“I’m not sure I want to know what’s going on,” he told them.

“Me neither,” Sam sighed. “But I guess we’ll find out sooner or later.”

“Make it later,” Charlie replied. “It’s about to start.”

It was true: the sun, that had been agonizing the entire time they had been there, had finally set down. A black velvet night appeared on top of their heads. Dean took a chunk of his burger and wondered if he might have overdone the barbecue sauce.

“You’re awfully calm,” Sam commented, looking at his brother.

“Well, yeah,” Dean shrugged. “I mean, whatever it was that Mrs. Periwinkle and Rowena were talking about, it’s clearly not our concern.”

“How is a possible witching war not our concern?” Sam frowned.

“Because it isn’t,” Dean answered simply, and raised his chin in Meg and Castiel’s direction, who were still sitting side by side with their heads pressed together. “ _They_ are.”

“And what if they get caught up in that war?” Sam asked.

“I’m pretty confident is nothing they can’t handle,” Dean replied, taking another bite of his burger. “Now eat, little brother. Enjoy the damn holiday, will you?”

Sam still didn’t look convinced, but he bit into the burger anyways. He made a little hum of pleasure, and Dean smiled, satisfied.

“There!” Charlie pointed at the sky as an arrow rose above the lights of the town and exploded in thousands of sparkles raining down on the earth. Charlie clapped with the enthusiasm of a little girl, while Crowley stood up in his little legs and stretched his hands in the air, almost as if he wanted to catch the fireworks before they came back down on the ground.

“Lights!” he shouted, pointing at them. “Mama, lights!”

“Yes, Fergus, lights,” Rowena replied. “Do you want to see mama make some lights too?”

Crowley nodded, with his eyes wide open and his mouth hanging ajar. Rowena started rubbing her hands against one another, until a strange blue glitter appeared in her fingertips. Rowena extended her hands, with her fingers still sparkling all blue and bright, while Crowley laughed and tried to touch them only to receive a small shock. He chuckled every time and went right back to try and high-five his mother. Rowena was smiling, too. It was a weird smile, all wide and… sincere. Like she was actually happy to be there, sharing that moment with the little devil of her son.

“Would you look at that?” Dean commented, and took a swig of his beer.

Rowena might have been an undesirable, manipulative, ambitious witch with an agenda on her own. But she also clearly cared about Crowley.

That was something Dean could behind.


	12. Excursion

Meg put down her fist on the table, with such force that it shook a little.

“I need money,” she declared to a baffled Sam, who started at her with confusion over the screen of his laptop.

“Didn’t Dean already give you your allowance?” he asked after a few seconds.

“I need _more_ money,” Meg replied, with a shrug. “And I need you to drive me to the mall.”

“Can’t you just go on your bike?”

“I’m asking you for money and a ride to the mall,” Meg pointed out. “I’m going shopping, genius. I can’t carry all the bags with me on the bike.”

“Why do you need to go shopping?” Sam asked, frowning.

“It’s Peggy’s birthday,” she reminded him. “I need to buy her a present. And I need to buy myself a cute pajama for the sleepover afterwards.”

“Woah, woah, hang on,” Sam said raising a finger in the air. “What sleepover?”

“The sleepover Peggy is having after the party,” Meg repeated, exasperated, like she thought Sam was being obtuse on propose.

“You didn’t ask us for permission for a sleepover,” Sam said, mentally reviewing all the conversations he’d had with Meg that week. As far as he could see, she had only been complaining about Crowley nonstop.

“Sam, please,” Meg said, rolling her eyes. “I already made up my mind about going, do you really think something as minimal as you giving me permission is going to stop me?”

Sam reckoned it wouldn’t.

“Let me get the keys,” he sighed. “Is Cas coming too?”

“Nope, the nerd already did all his shopping,” Meg replied.

Sam had to do a double take. “Wait, he’s invited to the sleepover too?”

“Of course not, what kind of parent do you think Mrs. Walker is?” Meg asked. “The kind that lets mixed sleepover happen all the time in her house?”

Sam caught the sarcasm in her tone, but he decided not to comment on it. It was either that Meg was unhappy that Castiel couldn’t go with her, or he was taking a jab at him for not noticing that they moved to each other’s rooms every night. Because of course he noticed, he wasn’t an idiot. He still hadn’t decided what to do with that information. Dean had been pretty chill about the whole “witches going at each other’s throats any minute now” business, but he wasn’t sure he’d be so okay with the little monsters disobeying a direct order. He decided to wait until the end of the summer to tell him.

“Are you going somewhere?” Rowena asked, when she saw them heading for the door. She was sitting on the couch, barefoot and reading a book that must have had at least a couple of centuries. Crowley was on the carpet, playing with clay, and from the stains around his mouth, eating it too.

“Just shopping,” Sam said.

“Yeah, to a super tiny mall where there’s pretty much nothing interesting,” Meg said. “You would get bored.”

“Oh, but I love shopping,” Rowena said, putting the book down. “Can we come too?”

Meg started vigorously shaking her head.

“Gee, Rowena, wouldn’t Crowley get bored?” Sam tried to say, casually. “I mean, there aren’t many places where kids can play…”

“I’ll take my chances,” Rowena said, and with a gesture of her hand, made her shoes appeared from beneath the couch. “Besides, I think Fergus would like to get some fresh air, wouldn’t you?”

Crowley looked up with a piece of clay between his lips. Rowena delicately pulled it away from him and smiled at them.

“Let’s get on our way!”

And then was when Sam realized there was pretty much nothing he could say to make her change her mind. Not that Meg hated him any less for it: she called shotgun with the sole propose of glaring at him all the way to the town.

“What do you want me to say?” he asked her for the fifth time. Meg huffed and rolled her eyes at him. It was the most teenager thing Sam had ever seen her do, and it was pretty irritating, if he was telling the truth.

“Fergus, are you okay?” Rowena asked her son in the backseat. “You look a little pale, sweetie…”

Crowley opened his mouth, and let out a gross belch that was promptly followed by a projectile of vomit that ended on the back of the driver’s seat. Sam decided he wasn’t going to mention that to Dean either.

“You didn’t know your son gets car-sick?” Meg asked twenty minutes later, after they left the Impala in the car-wash near the mall.

“Well, how was I supposed to know that?” Rowena asked, holding a still green-looking Crowley to her chest. “We teleport, we don’t travel by car like…”

She stopped herself, but Sam was pretty certain she had been a second away from saying something like “peasants.”

“In any case,” he sighed. “We have a couple of hours until they finish cleaning it up, so let’s jest get on with it.”

The first stop they made was at a jewelry shop, where Meg demanded to see all the bracelets and necklaces with peridots they had. The girl behind the counter (whose name tag read “Laura” and couldn’t be older than eighteen) obeyed hurriedly, and when everything in the store was displayed in front of Meg, she stood there for about fifteen minutes with a hand on her chin, looking at them all undecidedly.

“Come to think of it, I don’t know if something like this will be a good present for Peggy,” she commented under her breath.

“Are you freaking kidding me?” Laura huffed. Then she seemed to realize she’d said it out loud, because her face showed a horrified expression. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean… well, of course, you’re entitled to purchase whatever you want…”

Meg side-eyed the girl, and Sam was so certain he would have to intervene to avoid some kind of murder or ancient curse being cast on poor Laura he stood up from the ottoman where he was waiting and ran towards her. But in the end, the demon only showed a wicked smirk.

“I like you,” she determined. “You’ve got spunk.”

“Are you done picking up the present yet?” Rowena asked, sauntering in the store with Crowley by his side. His face was sticky and dirty, and he was energetically sucking from a lollipop as big as his fist.

“You do know we still have a ride back in the car, right?” Sam cringed.

“Oh, relax, he would have digested it by then and probably be sleeping like a baby from the sugar rush,” Rowena replied, with a dismissive gesture. “Oh, gemstones!” she exclaimed, enthusiastically leaning over the counter. “Are you going to buy a birthstone for your little friend, dear?”

“That’s the plan,” Meg replied through gritted teeth.

“That’s a very nice thought, but I’m afraid this is wrong,” Rowena said. “The birthstone for August is sardonyx.”

“No, it’s peridot,” Meg replied, with a sigh of impatience. “I know my stones, okay? You’re not the only one who dabbles with magic around here.”

“I’m sure there’s plenty you know,” Rowena said, giving Meg a condescending pat in the head. “But in this case you should listen to experience. I have been around for centuries, and sardonyx has always been better aligned to August children…”

“And I have been around for _millennia_ , and I’m telling you, it’s peridot,” Meg interrupted.

“Uh, guys…” Sam tried to intervene, because Laura was looking at both them weird.

“But sardonyx is a much prettier gem!” Rowena argued. “A lot more facets and colors, and it was very regarded for people who lacked eloquence and valor.”

“Right, because I’m going to give Peggy a gem that says _‘Hey, you stutter and you’re a coward’_ ,” Meg replied, sarcastically. She froze for a moment, like she was thinking about it, and then shook her head. “No, peridots are an older sign of wealth and way more significant.”

“Have it your way,” Rowena said, with a fake shrug. “But you’re making a mistake,” she added in a singsong tone.

“Oh, for the love of… hey, spunky girl,” Meg said, turning to Laura. “Can you tell us which the goddamn August birthstone is?”

Laura (who looked a little scared at this point) disappeared beneath the counter for a moment. When she popped again, she was holding a small book that read _Guide to stone’s meanings and uses_. She passed the pages like a nervous student looks for an answer for an impatient professor.

“Uh… it says here that both sardonyx and peridot can be considered birthstones for August,” she replied after a moment.

“That can’t be right,” Rowena said, snatching the book from her.

Meg looked just as frustrated, but as always, she used the moment to get away with hers.

“Peridot is prettier,” she determined. “Give me that necklace.”

So they left the store with a very satisfied Meg and a very scorned Rowena.

“No, no, no, this is all backwards!” she kept saying, as she passed the pages of the little book. “How could they have twisted and confused so many centuries of knowledge? I should write to the editorial immediately…”

“Hey, miss,” Laura, the spunky girl, had to follow them outside. “Do you think I can have the book back?”

“Well, one thing less,” Sam said. “Let’s get going,” he said, pointing in the general direction of the nearest clothing shop.

“Woah, wait, I’m not buying there,” Meg stopped him with grimace of disgust. “I said I needed a _cute_ pajama, not a potato sack. Let’s go to the second floor.”

Sam frowned for a second, before realizing what was on the second floor.

“Oh, no,” he said, rising a finger in front of Meg’s face. “You are too young to be shopping at a lingerie store…”

“I also need a bra,” Meg declared, in a volume unnecessarily loud. Several people turned around to look at them. “So I’m thinking maybe I should go while you wait for me here.”

“I’m not letting you go alone, Meg.”

“Aren’t you?” Meg said, crossing her arms over her chest. “Do you want to look like a middle-aged creep buying bras for his teenage daughter?”

Sam couldn’t really argue with that point. There were enough people glancing in their direction as it was.

“Okay, fine,” he agreed. “But Rowena goes with you.”

Rowena lifted her head from the book. “Excuse me?”

“Why does she have to come with me?” Meg protested.

“To make sure you don’t bite anybody,” Sam replied. “Rowena, give that book back, will you?”

Rowena handed the book to Laura with a scoff, who promptly returned to her spot behind the counter and texted her friends that the shop might have just been visited by a family of vampires.

 

* * *

 

“Don’t let him out of your sight, at any times.”

“Rowena, I got this,” Sam assured her. It looked simple enough. Crowley was sitting on a bench right outside the store, still entertained in licking his lollipop. “ _You_ make sure she doesn’t get out of your sight.”

Meg was on the store’s doorway, tapping her foot on the floor and huffing impatiently.

“It should be easy enough,” Rowena said. Sam wanted to tell her not to trust that idea, but Rowena was already walking towards Meg. “Are you ready, my dear?”

“Oh, joy,” Meg said, smiling sarcastically. “I am so excited.”

They walked into the store with the most awkward false smiles ever.

“I think they’re going to be fine,” Sam commented. “Don’t you, Crowley?”

He looked at his right to discover the spot where Crowley had been standing two seconds before was empty.

“Crowley?”

 

* * *

 

“Hello, and welcome!” said the blonde behind the counter when they walked in. “What can I do for you today?”

“I need a bra, A cup,” Meg said, going straight to the point. “But nothing with little dinosaurs or any kind of fluffy creature in them. And a nightgown. No, you know what? Make it some pajama shorts and throw in a sleeveless shirt. Otherwise I’ll suffocate in this weather.”

The woman blinked, like she wasn’t used to young clients being so direct about their needs.

“Very well,” she said, recovering her smile almost immediately. “And is there something I can offer to your grandmother?”

Rowena flipped her head towards her so fast she must have got whiplash.

“Excuse you?” she snapped.

“Oh, no, she’s my weird aunt from Scotland,” Meg said, and leaned confidentially towards the girl. “She’s trying to get a rich fourth husband, so maybe fix her up with something sexy?”

“Oh, I get it,” the girl said. “Janet, can you come here and help this girl while I tend to the lady?”

Janet, a black girl in her twenties, stopped organizing nightgowns at the other side of the store and strutted towards Rowena.

“How can I help you, ma’am?” she asked with a radiant smile.

“I don’t need…”

“Let me guess, you’re a silk and lace kind of woman, aren´t you?” Janet guessed. “You’re in luck. We have a very varied selection that’s just arrived in black and red.”

Rowena uncrossed her arms. “Well… I guess taking a peak won’t hurt anybody.”

 

* * *

 

Sam tried with all his strength not to despair for the first five minutes. Crowley was a fat little kid with short legs. He couldn’t have gone that far, could he?

But after checking his immediate surroundings, under benches and tables and all possible hideouts for someone Crowley’s size, he was forced to admit that maybe a little despair was due. They had barely survived the summer with Rowena in a good mood. He didn’t want to even imagine what she would do if he lost her son.

“Excuse me, have you seen a kid?” he started asking the random passersby. “He was short and sort of chubby; he was eating a lollipop…”

Everybody kept shaking his head, and a couple of women looked at him very worried.

“Perhaps you should alert mall security,” one of them suggested.

“Oh, no, that won’t be necessary,” Sam said, nervously because he didn’t want them to think he was neglecting a child. “I’m sure he’s just around here. I’ll find him in no time.”

But after thirty minutes, Crowley was still a no show. Sam was tempted to call Dean and tell him to bring some sort of iron to defend himself when Rowena tried to strangle him, but then he remembered the vomit in the Impala, and he really wasn’t sure whose rage he’d rather face. In the end, he decided to take his chances with Rowena and alert the security.

“Please, you have to find him,” Sam told the cop mall, desperate. “He’s about this tall, brown hair…”

“Don’t worry, sir,” the mall cop said. He was a man who wore sunglasses on the inside for some reason and a moustache that might have been perfectly fine in a ninety-seventies’ action movie. He put a hand on Sam’s shoulder as if to console him. “We’ll find your son.”

“He’s my… my nephew,” Sam lied. “But yes, please you have to help me.”

And then the cop did something that made him regret his decision to trust him: he picked up his radio and instructed to whoever was on the other side to announce Crowley’s description on the mall’s speakers.

“That… was that… really necessary?” Sam cringed. There was no way Rowena wouldn't find out he'd lost Crowley now.

“Sir, I assure you, we know how to do our jobs,” the mall cop said. “We’ll have the kid back in no time, you’ll see. Now, please show me where was the last place you saw him.”

 

* * *

 

Meg had finished picking and paying for her clothes hours ago (well, more like minutes, but she’d never been very patient), and was now sitting in the designated place for bored husbands and boyfriends next to the changing booths.

“Are you done, _auntie_?” she growled for the hundredth time.

“Now, now, dear, you cannot rush perfection!” Rowena’s voice came from inside.

Meg rolled her eyes so far they probably would have got stuck on the back of her head.

At that very moment, the mall’s speakers came to life to announce that a kid was missing. He was about four, with dark hair, a blue shirt and probably had a lollipop with him.

“Huh,” Meg muttered. “That sounds a lot like…”

Rowena emerged from the booth, with a horrified face and wearing nothing by a violet transparent babydoll, which was an image Meg could have gone her entire existence without seeing.

“Fergus!” she shrieked.

“Woah, Rowena, wait!” Meg tried to call her, but Rowena was already running towards the door.

Sam and the mall cop were standing there when a redheaded hurricane ambushed them and grabbed Sam by the lapels of his shirt.

“Where is my son?” she demanded to know. “I told you not to let him out of your sight! Where is Fergus?!” she asked, raising her voice to a hysterical yell.

Meg saw something moving out of the corner of her eye. She had only taken a few steps towards the door, so she was technically still inside the store, because she didn’t want to mix up with the crowd that had stopped to stare at the shouting woman in the violet babydoll. That’s why she was standing next to a hangers rack, and that’s why she gave out a little jump when they moved suddenly.

Crowley emerged from among a bunch of silky nightgowns, with the stick of his lollipop stuck to the cheek, and blinking sleepily under the store’s lights.

“Momma?” he called out.

Rowena stopped shouting immediately and turned towards her kid.

“Fergus!” she screamed, running to pick him up. “Where were you?”

“He must have followed you inside the store when you weren’t looking,” deduced the mall cop. “Kids do that sometimes.”

“Oh, thank you,” Rowena said, batting her long eyelashes at the cop. “Thank you so much for your help.”

“Please, lady,” the mall cop said, standing all straight and masculine, but a subtle shade of pink was covering his cheeks. Perhaps because he had just noticed what Rowena was wearing. “I was just doing my job.”

“Yes,” Rowena said, putting a hand on his forearm. “Yes, you were.”

Sam and Meg exchanged a look, and decided it was way past time to go home.

 

* * *

 

“Hey, Cas,” Dean called from the kitchen. “Where is everybody?”

Castiel, who was in the couch reading, shrugged a little.

Dean was about to add that not only he hadn’t seen neither Crowley nor Rowena all day, which was worrying, but it was also Sam and Meg who were missing. The bunker’s door creaked open right then, and the entire group walked down the stairs.

“There you are,” Dean asked. “Where…?”

“Don’t ask,” Sam groaned.

“I’m going to go take a shower,” Meg decided.

Crowley walked two steps more, and then fell face down on the rug, where he promptly went to sleep.

“I don’t know why you guys are so affected,” said Rowena. She flailed down on the couch, startling Castiel. “I had a great time. _And_ I got a date on Friday.”

Dean decided he didn’t want to know what they’d been up to that day after all.


	13. Presents

Summer birthdays were the worst, and no one knew that better than Margaret Walker. People tended to forget about them, and since school was out, she had no chances of inviting everybody she would have liked to be there. She still remembered her fifth birthday, when no one but a couple of her cousins from Kansas City showed up, and they’d only stayed for a few minutes. Her mom kept promising that next year would be better, but this (her fifteenth birthday) was the year Peggy actually believed it.

Ever since she’d become friends with Castiel and Meg, things had certainly been better for Peggy. The bullies always left her alone, she could always count on someone showing up at her birthdays and she had even got a sort of, semi-boyfriend. Meg had made friends with Anita and Tammy that year, but instead of leaving her aside like Peggy feared she would (because Anita and Tammy were _so_ cool, and of course Meg would become friends with them), Meg had done everything in her power to include her in the group.

So finally, after all those years, Peggy knew enough girls to fulfill her heart’s desire since she was ten: to host a sleepover.

“I don’t understand why it has to be just girls,” Castiel had complained when she’d told them about it the day they all went out for burgers. “This kind of separation seems completely arbitrary to me. Meg and I have been sharing a room since…”

Meg had thrown a chip at him, and Castiel shut up. Peggy was already used to them saying that kind of thing, but Gary looked at them with a frown.

“Aren’t you two cousins?” he’d asked.

“A sleepover sounds great,” Meg had said, blatantly ignoring the question. “What time do you want me there?”

“Well, there’s the party before at around five, and you guys can come to that if you want,” Peggy had explained. In fact, she had wanted to disregard the pre-party altogether, but her mother had insisted they had to do it so her cousins from Kansas City could come. She had also forced her to invite her cousin Kate to the sleepover, but Peggy guessed not everything could be perfect.

“Will there be cake?” Gary had asked, and when she’d nodded, he’d thrown an arm around her shoulders and said: “Then count me in!”

To say that Peggy was excited was to sell it short. Many kids from her class had promised to go too, thanks to the Facebook event her mother had allowed her to create, so she was ready to have her house a little more crowded than usual. She had bought a cute dress for the occasion she was dying to use, and on top of that all, the morning of the party was the day the dentist removed her brackets.

“Well, there’s my smiling Margaret,” Dr. Finch said when she crossed the door. “Ready to live your life with perfectly aligned teeth?”

Peggy had discussed Dr. Finch and his obsession for aligned teeth with Meg and Castiel, and they’d both agreed with her that he must have been some sort of weird sadist with an unhealthy obsession for teeth. Meg had declared that was a description that could apply to all dentists, in fact. But if everything turned out as Peggy expected, then she would only have to see him once or twice a year from then on.

“And there we are!” the dentist said when he finished. “How do you feel?”

Peggy opened and closed her mouth several times. She felt weird. Her lips were suddenly so elastic, like she could do a lot of things with them, like smiling or pronouncing words correctly…

“Yes, that will pass,” the dentist guarantee her as if she had just given him a detailed account of her new sensations. He accompanied her to the door, where her mother was waiting for her.

“Oh, look at you!” Mrs. Walker exclaimed, with the biggest smile (also of perfectly aligned teeth). “My little woman!”

Peggy’s cheeks were burning, but she still couldn’t help but to smile.

 

* * *

 

Meg and Castiel arrived on the hour, as usual, and neither of them made a comment about Peggy’s absent brackets. It was a little like her not mentioning it when Meg’s eyes went all black or when things suddenly fell when Castiel was around them, even though he had nowhere near enough to push them. They did compliment her on the dress.

“Open my present!” Meg said, putting the little package in her hand. “It’ll go great with it!”

“I’m not supposed to open the presents until after the party,” Peggy commented.

“I won’t tell your mom if you don’t,” Meg shrugged.

Peggy figured that was a good logic. The necklace with the little green pendant (a peridot, Meg informed her) really did go well with her white dress with green limes., so she wore it proudly as more and more guests began to arrive.

At first, it was just the usual dribs and drabs, but as the afternoon went on, Peggy had the impression more people than she had invited were knocking on the door. Most of the kids she recognized from school, but they weren’t friends or had classes together or anything that would justify them being there. And the most uncomfortable part (besides the fact that her mother was working a miracle with the plastic cups because there definitely weren’t enough for everybody) was that she felt that everyone there was staring at her. Of course, whenever she raised her head to meet their glance, they promptly looked away and continued chatting with other people like it was nothing.

“Perhaps I’m a little paranoid,” she said.

“Or maybe they _are_ looking at you, because it’s your birthday,” Anita said, shaking her head, which made all the earrings in her ear twinkle.

“It may have something to do with you being out of your frame,” Tammy added.

“My what?”

“Your frame,” she explained, moving her hands around her face as if to form a box. “Your braces.”

“Oh,” Peggy said, touching her face again. She had managed to completely forget about that. “Maybe.”

“Hey, Peggy,” a boy said, walking up to her. She knew his name was Peter and was with her in Advanced Math class, but as far as she remembered, that was the first time they exchanged words. “How about some music in this place?”

“Oh, yes, music,” Peggy said, relieved to have something to do. “Good idea.”

She run to the computer and put on the playlist she had prepared for the occasion. Strictly popular songs from the last years. She hadn’t let her mother anywhere near it.

“Hey, Peggs,” Meg said, just as the first note of the song started. “We’re going to need more sausage snacks.”

“Why?”

“Well, Cas kind of got a hold of the plate…”

Peggy looked at the place in the couch where Meg was pointing, only to find Castiel was sitting there, growling and glaring at whoever dared to try and take one of the snacks.

“I’ll get more,” Peggy promised. “Can you keep things entertained here?”

The little smirk that appeared on Meg’s face made Peggy think she shouldn’t have asked her.

“Don’t worry, I got it,” her friend assured her as she pushed her to the kitchen.

Five minutes, Peggy told herself. She was going to be gone for five minutes until she got the snacks. Not many disasters could happen in that amount of time, could they?

After being friends with Meg for so many years, Peggy thought she should have known better. Her mother (who was in the kitchen chatting with her aunts) happily provided her with the snacks, but Peggy never managed to put them on the table. The moment she crossed the door, Pete was there, smiling and getting all up in her personal space.

“Let’s dance!” he invited her.

“Oh, right now? But I have to…”

“Come on,” Peter snatched the plate from her hands and left it on the floor (Mrs. Walker would’ve had an attack if she’d seen that). “It’s your party, isn’t it? You should be dancing.”

Peggy hesitated a moment longer, but after taking a look around the room, she realized Gary had not arrived yet, so she might as well.

“Okay.”

Peter grabbed her hand and guided her to the middle of the living room. Someone had move the couches aside, and there were people dancing there already, including Tammy and Anita with another pair of guys. Peggy spun and jumped, trying to follow Peter’s rhythm, and by the time the song ended, she was breathless and tired, but smiling wide.

“Dance with me next!” another guy (she thought his name was Julian, but she wasn’t certain).

“No, me!”

“Guys, come on,” Tammy said, standing in front of her protectively. “There’s plenty of birthday girl to go around!”

“Form an orderly line, gentlemen,” Anita said. “And ask some others girl to dance, too, don’t be shy!”

Peggy had no idea why suddenly so much people wanted to dance with her. She assumed they were being kind because it was her birthday, and she was thankful to every one of them. Even if it meant that by the end of the evening her feet would be killing her.

 

* * *

 

“You want to dance?”

“Nah.”

Castiel put down the sausage snack he was about to pop into his mouth, and stared at Meg with unbridled disappointment.

“Oh, come on, Clarence,” she rolled her eyes at him. “It’s just a stupid, pointless human courting exercise. Why would we lower ourselves to participating in it?”

Castiel looked at the moving couples in the middle of the living room. “They look happy,” he commented under his breath.

“So what? We’re happy eating here,” Meg pointed out, and proceeded to steal some of the snacks from his plate.

“Yeah, but…”

“Castiel, eat and shut up,” Meg groaned. “We’re _not_ dancing, okay?”

Castiel picked up another sausage and put it in his mouth with a sullen gesture. Meg almost felt bad for him. This was a party, after all, and she supposed they should be doing something to blend in with the crowd (or they would forever be the pair of weird cousins who sat on their ass and ate the entire party, as if they weren’t already), but she still maintained that dancing was too much of an indignity to give into in.

Luckily for them, Gary arrived at that moment, and if anyone was even remotely paying attention to them, they stopped exactly fifteen seconds later: the time it took for Gary to cross the door and see his almost-sort-of-girlfriend dancing with another boy.

At first, he just stood there looking confuse as to what was happening or why. Most teenagers in the room were going to start their sophomore year in a couple of weeks and they knew each other pretty well. Not counting two of Peggy’s cousins, he was the only junior in the party, which made him stick out like a sore thumb. Some of them knew who he was and elbowed each other before pointing at him, but he’d never really talked to any of them.

The only people he could have exchange confused looks with were Castiel and Meg, and they were both not paying attention to him. The first was brooding, and the other one was trying to convince him his brooding was ridiculous.

“Why would you even want to dance anyway?” she was saying, poking him with her index finger. “Those wings of yours would get on the way and slap everyone in the face. The most likely outcome is that you end up lying on your back and unable to get up, like an angelic tortoise.”

The shadow of a smirk crossed Castiel’s face at the idea, but it was clear he was decided to be mad about the issue a little bit longer.

Gary walked up to their couch in that moment.

“Hey, guys,” he greeted them. “Uh, who’s that?”

He pointed at the boy who was making Peggy spin on her heels, right in the middle of the improvised dance floor.

“George something?” Meg shrugged. “I think he’s in our History class.”

“Okay,” Gary said. “Why is he dancing with Peggy?”

“Because, unlike other girls, Peggy is kind enough to accept when someone asks her to dance,” Castiel shoot.

“You’re not going to guilt me into dancing, if that’s what you’re trying to do,” Meg groaned.

“Guys…”

“Dancing, like happiness, doesn’t need a justification,” Castiel replied, sticking his chin in the air. “You don’t really need a reason to dance. It’s a reason in and of itself.”

“Nice try,” Meg let out a short, dry laugh. “I’m still not doing it.”

“Guys,” Gary said again. “Why are all those guys around Peggy?”

Like a flock of doves detecting some bread on the ground, all the boys in the party had flown around the birthday girl as soon as the song was over. Tammy and Anita were trying to get them to ask in an orderly manner, while Peggy blushed furiously and shook her head with a shy smile on her newly liberated lips.

“Well, it _is_ her birthday,” Castiel pointed out. “I think it’s polite of them to try and keep her entertained in her own party. Party host rarely have the time or the opportunity to relax.”

“That’s a new level of blindness, even for you,” Meg huffed, apparently amused. “They just want Peggy to pay attention to them because she looks hot now that she doesn’t have her braces.”

Gary was suspecting that was the reason, but hearing someone stating it out loud make him sink a couple of inches on the floor.

In the meantime, Peggy had managed to escape her flock of newly found admirers and was walking towards them.

“Hello!” she greeted Gary, and threw her arms around him. “You’re late,” she scolded him, playfully.

“Yeah,” Gary said, hiding his hands in his pockets. “Uh… happy birthday.”

“Thank you,” Peggy smiled wide, her smile of perfectly aligned teeth. “Let’s get something to drink.”

“You sure?” Gary asked. “I wouldn’t want to distract you from… dancing.”

“Don’t be silly,” Peggy said. “After we’ve had a drink, you and I can dance, too.”

Gary’s face lit up a little as Peggy lead him away to the table where the drinks were.

“What did I tell you?” Meg said. “Dancing is for little humans, living their little lives.”

Castiel thought about arguing that Peggy was more than just a little human to them, but something had darkened in Meg’s expression as she looked around the room at the suddenly disappointed horde of teenage boys who watched as Gary and Peggy flirted and laughed with plastic cups in their hands.

“So if any of these little humans decides to interrupt the lives of our little humans,” she continued, cracking her knuckles ostentatiously. “I say we politely asked them not to.”

“I thought you very much preferred to either curse them or beat them up,” Castiel said. “It’s a more direct approach.”

Meg narrowed her eyes at him and for a moment, it looked like she was about to explain that that was exactly her plan. She noticed the little smirk on Castiel’s face and shook her head.

“You’re so cute sometimes, Clarence.”

 

* * *

 

The night was warm and starry by the time the guests started to leave Peggy’s house. Some were picked up by their parents, most by their older siblings they had convinced to pick them up to avoid the humiliation of being picked up by their parents. So the living room was almost empty now, except for a handful of people: the girls who were staying for the sleepover and a four or five boys, including Gary and Castiel. They were on the sitting on the carpet or the couch in the living room, all happily tired, and some of the boys were still trying to talk Peggy up, even though Gary was like, right there next to her, holding her hand.

“I don’t get it,” he complained to Meg and Castiel the minute Peggy left the room to help her mom with something in the kitchen. The two other boys followed her right to the door. “Why won’t they back off? Why won’t Peggy tell them to back off?”

“Peggy has spent half of her life not meeting the beauty standards of this day and age,” Castiel explained. “I’m inclined to believe she has no idea the attention she’s being showered with has something to do with her change of appearance.”

“That’s insane,” Gary complained. “She’s always been cute.”

“Yeah, but now you’re not the only one who notices,” Meg explained. “I suggest you do something big for her before any of these boors does.”

Gary’s cellphone twinkled in his pocket. He took it out, read it with the seriousness of a spy memorizing his assigned mission and then stood up. He sauntered towards the kitchen and glared at the two other boys until they stepped back, right at the moment Peggy came out of the kitchen with her mother.

“Oh, hey…”

“Hey. My sister’s outside,” Gary told her. “Do you want come with me and say hi?”

“Uh… sure,” Peggy said, although by the way she tilted her head, it was clear she thought that was a strange request.

Mrs. Walker waited exactly two seconds before she, Anita and Tammy all crowded around the window to look outside at the porch.

“Oh, my God,” Anita mumbled. “Meg, you gotta come and see this.”

“Is there a giant bat with rainbow wings out there?” Meg asked in a really loud voice. Everybody turned to stare at her like she was crazy. Castiel was the only one who was nodding like that made perfect sense.

“That _would_ be worth seeing.”

By the time everybody had finished marveling at how weird those two kids were, Peggy walked inside with a little smile on her face and her cheeks all flustered. Anita and Tammy pretended they were looking at the ceiling while Mrs. Walker pulled from the curtain and cleared her throat loudly.

“So,” she said in that casual tone mothers used to probe their children. “What did Gary want?”

Peggy, who seemed to be floating several miles higher than any mortal, shook her head like she had just been brusquely pulled back down to reality.

“Oh, he just wanted to give me my birthday present.”

And she smiled dreamily.

Two things happened at the same time: the relentless boy decided to leave because they were clearly out of the race, and Mrs. Walker started wishing Peggy never had her braces removed.


	14. Storytime

Castiel was definitely not happy when Sam and Dean showed up to take him home.

“It’s completely unreasonable,” he protested as the hunters practically had to drag him to the Impala. “I am friends with Peggy too, have been just as long as Meg. I cannot believe I am not allowed to stay just because I happen to inhabit a male body.”

“Cas, for the love of God,” Dean groaned, and then smiled and waved at Mrs. Walker, who was staring at them from the porch and probably wondering what was wrong with Castiel.

“Look, Cas, I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” Meg said, rolling her eyes. When Castiel still remained rooted to his spot, she leaned forward and placed one quick peck on his cheek. He turned red, and the distraction was enough for the Winchesters to shove him inside the car.

“Okay,” Sam said, as he closed the door. “You know the rules, Meg.”

“No black magic, no talking about supernatural things, no doing anything evil or fun,” Meg repeated, with a huff of impatience. “Yes, I get it. Can you guys go now? Tammy wants to make pizza and I have to help.”

Sam startled at how normal that had sounded and how weird it was coming out of Meg’s mouth, but he decided not to make any comments in case that encouraged her to prove she was still capable of acting like the demon she was.

“We’ll pick you up at ten in the morning, okay?”

“Make it eleven,” Meg said. “We’re probably going to stay up super late reading age inappropriate novels.”

That was more like it, and Sam was happy Dean was already inside the Impala and couldn’t hear her.

He climbed in the car and Meg waved at them one more time as they pulled away from the driveway.

“She’s all grown up, huh?” Dean commented. “Cas, sit down and put on your seatbelt.”

Castiel, who had been kneeling on the backseat with his nose stuck to the rear window, obeyed with a crestfallen sigh.

“Yep,” Sam sighed. “And I’m sure she’s going to have a lot more fun than us playing poker all night with Rowena.”

Castiel let out a whimper that sounded a lot like one a kicked puppy would make. Sam couldn’t blame him: Rowena played dirty, bluff with such confidence that it was impossible to tell when she was actually telling the truth, and didn’t hesitate to cheat.

“I’m sure Meg’s going to be super responsible about this,” Sam continued, trying to distract himself from those thoughts. “Not try to lead her friends down a path of witchcraft and dark arts.”

Dean snickered for a moment, and then his face turned to stone.

“But what if she does, though?” he asked, with a sudden note of panic in his voice. “We’ll be condemning those poor girls’ souls!”

“Indeed,” Castiel said, nodding vigorously. “So perhaps someone should make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Sam took a deep breath, suspecting he had a long night ahead of convincing his brother that surveilling a group of teenage girls was a sure-fire way of getting his ass landed in jail, and explaining to Cas (again) the whole thing about teenagers and hormones and why Mrs. Walker was right to not let any boy in that sleepover.

At that point, he probably would have chosen poker with Rowena.

 

* * *

 

“Now, don’t go to sleep very late,” Mrs. Walker told them. “And if you need anything, I’m sleeping in the other room. Just knock and give me a second to put something on.”

“Mom, oh, my God,” Peggy protested, looking down in embarrassment. Mrs. Walker smiled, like she had accomplished her mission in life.

“Good night, girls.”

“Good night, Mrs. Walker!” three voices chanted, while the fourth said: “Good night, auntie!”

Kate, Peggy’s cousin, was a chubby thirteen year old girl with shiny green eyes that looked overtly excited to be there and share the night with the “older girls.”

“So, what do we do now?” she asked, clenching her hands in two fists like that was the only way to contain her enthusiasm. “Can we, maybe, read magazines and made those personality tests to see which member of One Direction we would date?”

Anita and Tammy made disgruntled sounds. Meg, who had a magazine opened in front of her, looked up from it at Kate.

“Those tests are bullshit,” she said. “You can date whichever member of One Direction you want, Kate.”

Kate practically exploded at the idea. She squealed and laid on her side blushing furiously, maybe imagining her perfect wedding to a British singer already.

“We could play games,” Peggy suggested, opening her closet door. “I’ve got One, Monopoly…”

“Let’s not play Monopoly,” Anita said, looking like somebody had forced a piece down her throat. “I appreciate our friendship way too much for that.”

“Clue, then,” Peggy said, taking it out. “Meg?”

“You know I always love a little murder,” Meg said, closing her magazine.

“Me too,” Peggy said nonchalantly. The other girls stared at her, because hearing that statement coming out from such a sweet girl as Peggy was like seeing a bluebird opening its little beak and squawking like a crow. “Oh, I mean, murder mystery,” she corrected herself. “Like, detective stories and stuff.”

“Remember that Halloween you dressed up like Nancy Drew?” Meg snickered. “And tried to convince Cas to use the deerstalker so he would be Sherlock Holmes and I Watson?”

“Good times,” Peggy said, as she opened the Clue box and started pulling out the board and the cards.

Anita and Tammy exchanged a look, and then stared back at Peggy.

“You know, there was this big mystery some decades back,” Tammy said. “In the big abandoned house. You know, the one that is at the end of the lane…”

“Oh, no, that’s where Mrs. Periwinkle lives,” Peggy replied. “She’s nice, and she makes an excellent apple pie. She has a weird cat, though.”

Tammy blinked at her, obviously unhappy that her story had been discarded in such an disrespectful manner.

“The other house, Peggy,” Anita specified. “The big Tudor one, with the broken tree that’s five blocks away.”

“Oh, that one!” Peggy said, but then she frowned. “I’ve never heard of that.”

“Well it happened back in the sixties…”

“Hold on, hold on,” Meg interrupted them again. “You’re going to tell a ghost story, you better do it right. Pegs, you got a flashlight?”

Peggy took out one from her night-table, and Meg decidedly switched the lights off. In the darkness, they almost could hear Kate swallowing loudly.

“Guys? It’s just a story, right?”

Peggy turned on the flashlight and passed it to Tammy, who placed it beneath her chin to give her face a ghostly appearance.

“It all started when the Lancasters moved into that house,” she said, making her voice sound deeper and slower. “At first sight, they were a normal family, happily married with no children. He was a doctor, and she was a housewife who sold Avon products. That’s how she became acquainted with all the neighbors. They would invite her in for coffee, and she would tell them she and her husband moved to this town to start over, although she never said why they needed a new beginning.”

“They had probably murdered someone,” Meg said.

Tammy moved the flashlight to point at her.

“Excuse me, who is telling the story?”

“Sorry,” Meg apologized, but the smirk in her face contradicted her. “Continue.”

Tammy cleared her throat and proceeded to do just that.

“As time went by, people began to notice certain things about the Lancasters. The husband was always busy with his hospital hours, which meant that Mrs. Lancaster spent a lot of time alone at home. However, she never invited her neighbors over to return the coffee she had been offered in numerous occasions. The curtains of the house were always closed. And certain nights, if the air was clear, they could hear a baby’s crying coming out of the windows…”

“How did they hear it if the curtains were always drawn?” asked Peggy.

“Gee, I don’t know,” Tammy rolled her eyes. “They spent a lot of time spying on their neighbors. They didn’t have Internet.”

“Okay, sorry. Go on.”

Tammy, however, was too frustrated to do that, so she passed the flashlight to Anita, who also used it to illuminate her face.

“As time went by, the Lancasters became more and more reclusive. Mrs. Lancaster’s sells became more and more sporadic until one day they stopped altogether. Meanwhile, Doctor Lancaster became more and more irritable, mistreating his patients and sometimes submitting them to unnecessary and painful treatments. It was only a matter of time until someone under his care died, and when it happened, of course the hospital was forced to fire him. They say he refused to leave, and had to be dragged away by security guards while he shouted _‘You’ll regret this! You’ll all regret this! I am the most brilliant mind of this world, I can create life!’_ ”

“Well, he certainly had a flare for the dramatic,” Meg commented. Kate who had been silent as a mouse all that time, let a noise that could have been either a whimper or a little chuckle. Anita, unlike Tammy, was no discourage at all by the commentary, and continued:

“From then on, the Lancasters’ house was even more mysterious than before. People didn’t see them for so long that they started to believe they had skipped town, except because sometimes they saw the curtains move, like someone was taking a quick peek at the world outside. And the baby’s crying continued.” Anita made a dramatic pause, and then went on: “And then, one night, the screaming began. The neighbors would later describe it as the sound someone makes when their skin is being stripped away…”

“How did they know what sound a person makes when their skin is stripped away?” Peggy asked.

“Oh, come on,” Tammy groaned.

“No, wait, that’s a valid question,” Meg added. Anita didn’t even bother to acknowledge the interruption.

“Terrified, the neighbors called the police, thinking that Doctor Lancaster had finally lost it and was attacking his wife,” she said. “But when they arrived, they found something much worse.”

“Hey, girls, why don’t we watch a movie instead?” Kate suggested, very loudly. “Something with… doggies or kittens, maybe…”

The other girls hushed her.

“They found Mrs. Lancaster,” Anita continued. “Dr. Lancaster was face down on the carpet, which was soaked in his blood. Mrs. Lancaster was by his side, with the scalpel she had used to kill him still in her hands. Her eyes were vacant, and she looked at the police like she didn’t know why they were there.”

Anita let out a whine so deep and profound that if they didn’t know better, her friends would have thought somebody had just stabbed her.

“ _It wouldn’t die_ ,” she said, in a voice that sounded at the edge of breaking. “That’s what she repeated, over and over: _‘I tried to kill it, but it wouldn’t die!’_ The police arrested her there, but as they were taking her away, they heard a loud noise coming from the basement,” Anita stretched her hand and knocked on the edge of Peggy’s bed to illustrate the noise. “Thump, thump, thump. Like heavy footsteps. Two police officers decided to go investigate. They hadn’t so much as touched the basement’s doorknob when Mrs. Lancaster had a breakdown: she started struggling and shouting at the top of her lungs: _‘Don’t go in there! Don’t let it out! Set it on fire, for the love of God, set it on fire!’_ ”

“Keep it down, you’re going to wake my mom,” Peggy warned her.

“The police dragged her away,” Anita continued, though she did drop her voice a little bit. “And against all her warnings, they went down to the basement. For a moment, nothing in the house moved. Then… BANG, BANG, BANG!”

Peggy hushed her, but asked: “So what happened?”

“Nobody knows,” Anita said, in the same cavernous tone she had abandoned as the story progressed. “The two officers said they thought they saw something moving in the basement. Merely weeks later, they both left the service citing personal reasons. Whatever is it that they saw, it was never found. What they did find, was the evidence of the horrifying experiments Lancaster was conducting: organs in jars, refrigerators with preserved body parts, blood spatters everywhere. Do you understand what that means?”

“It means those people were alive when he cut them up,” Tammy clarified, in case somebody had missed that. Kate pulled the covers over her face with a whimper.

“Nobody knows exactly what he was trying to accomplish,” Anita continued. “But what it is known is that the house could never be sold, and sometimes, when the nights are clear, you can still hear those footsteps coming and going: thump, thump, THUMP!”

A muffled scream came out from the bundle of covers Kate had become. Peggy had the good sense to put a hand over her mouth. There were some footsteps outside the door.

“Girls, keep it down, please,” Mrs. Walker’s groggy voice came on.

“Sorry, Mrs. Walker!” they all said in unison.

She walked away again, and Peggy let go of Kate. Meg switched the lights back on.

“Not bad,” she congratulated Tammy and Anita. “Except because you totally ripped that from the first season of American Horror Story.”

“Did not!” Tammy argued.

“Did too!” Meg insisted. “Don’t argue with me, I have all the DVDs!”

“Well, the house is there,” Anita said. “And there is something weird about it, because it just won’t sell. I know because my aunt works at the real estate company that bought it.”

“Maybe there’s just something wrong with the plumbing and your aunt’s company is too cheap to fix it,” Meg suggested. Anita threw a pillow at her, and Meg dodged it while laughing.

“Well, it was a good story,” Peggy said. “Anybody wants to eat some cheese balls while we play Clue?”

Even Kate was thrilled at the idea.

 

* * *

 

But not even all the cheese balls and murder jokes in the world (“I say it was in the bathroom with the toilet paper” – “How do you murder someone with toilet paper?” – “You force it down their throats”) were enough to make Kate forget about the monster that lived in the Lancasters’ basement. Long after the others had gone to sleep, she remained wide awake, with her eyes glued to the ceiling, imagining every single creak and crack the house made were the steps of the creature coming to get them. She tried relaxing, telling herself it was just a silly story, but her heart still pounded loudly in her chest, and her forehead was still covered in cold sweat.

And the most embarrassing part was that only she seemed to be having that problem. Judging by the deep, calmed breathings of the rest of the girls, it was pretty clear none of them had trouble falling asleep. But she kept thinking about dark figures dragging their feet on basements, and mad doctors with axes and scalpels and…

“Will you stop already?”

Kate jumped off her sleeping bag with a scream. Meg was sitting on hers, staring at her. Her eyes looked unnaturally pitch black in the darkness, and she had an irritated expression in her eyes.

“It’s hard enough to sleep as it is,” she told her. “It’s impossible when you keep moving and sighing like that.”

“I… uh… I’m sorry,” Kate whispered. “I didn’t mean… you can’t sleep either?”

She hoped Meg would admit she couldn’t and that she too couldn’t stop thinking about the monster, because if a girl as cool as Meg had been affected by the story the same way she did, then she wouldn’t feel as pathetic and immature about it.

Meg huffed loudly.

“I have leftover energy,” she said. “What’s your excuse?”

She wasn’t bothering to keep her voice down, so Peggy lifted her head.

“What is it?” she groaned. Anita, who was sleeping by her side, also moved to indicate she was awake.

“Katie, here, can’t sleep,” Meg said, irritated. “And it’s really annoying.”

“Tammy doesn’t seem to have a problem with it,” Anita pointed out.

Indeed, Tammy was spread out all over her sleeping bag, with her mouth hanging open and snoring slightly.

“Hey, let’s draw things on her face!” Anita suggested.

Peggy shut that down by turning on her lamp. “What’s the problem, Kate?”

Kate shifted, embarrassed, but Peggy knew her cousin well enough to guess:

“It was the story, wasn’t it?”

“It was just so creepy!” Kate cried. “I can’t… what if it escapes the basement? It’s too close! It could come for us!”

“Oh, for the love of…” Meg muttered, and stood up.

“What are you doing?” Peggy asked when she saw her opening the closet.

“If it’s the only way to get her to calm down,” Meg said, as she pulled out everybody’s clothes and started tossing it at their respective owners. “We’re going to that stupid house to prove there is _no_ monster.”

“I’m not sure we should be getting out of the house this late…” Peggy protested, but Anita was already sitting up, fully awake.

“Yes!” she said, with eyes glimmering with enthusiasm. “Excursion to the haunted house!”

“That’s not really necessary,” Kate said, with a weak voice. “I know there’s no monster. We don’t have to…”

A shoe landed on Tammy, who woke up immediately.

“What?” she groaned.

“We’re going on a monster hunting excursion!” Anita informed her.

Tammy stared at her friends for a while, then pulled the cover over her face.

“That’s nice,” she muttered. “Let me know how it went in the morning.”


	15. Haunted II

Sam didn’t think it was possible to fall out of practice of something he had been doing his entire life, but it turned that almost five years of actually sleeping in a bed every night made sleeping in the car with his face pressed against the window a lot more uncomfortable than he remembered. He managed to get a good full hour before the smell of the coffee Dean kept pouring in his cup woke him up again.

“You sure you don’t want some?” his brother offered him.

“I hate you,” Sam muttered, rubbing his eyes.

The worst part of it all is that they had actually managed to go back to the bunker before Dean’s obsessive overprotectiveness kicked in. Sam had already put on his pajama pants and was ready to spend maybe an hour or two playing poker with Rowena, but then Dean and Castiel had crossed the living room in a not at all suspicions manner with a not at all suspicious duffle bag.

“Guys?” Sam had called them. They had both frozen in their spot. “What are you doing?”

“We are, well… uh, we are…” Dean had stuttered.

“Going… star-gazing?” Castiel had completed.

They were both awful liars.

“You’re not going to spy on Meg and her friends, are you?” Sam had asked, although he already knew the answer perfectly well.

“No!” Dean had said, a little too fast and a little too loud for it to be true. “Where do you even get that idea? That’s insane!”

Castiel had noticed their words weren’t convincing Sam at all, so he’d been the first to confess:

“We’re just a little worried about her, okay?”

Sam had rubbed his face. Instead of arguing that Meg was mature enough to not do anything particularly stupid and that, seriously, there was no way to explain why they’d been spying on a teenagers sleepover if they were caught, he’d told them to wait for him to change.

And now it was three in the morning, and nothing particularly weird had happened. They could see Peggy’s window from where they had parked the car, but Sam had practically jumped at Dean’s throat when he’d taken out a pair of binoculars.

“Oh, my God, no, you’re not doing that!” he’d shouted, taking it away from his hands.

“Come on, Sam, we need visuals,” Dean had protested.

“This is not a goddamned mission!” Sam had replied. “Do you have any idea how creepy and inappropriate we are being right now without actually spying into a teenage girl’s room?”

Dean had remained undeterred.

“I just want to check they hadn’t got their hands on an actual Ouija board or something like that,” he’d insisted. “You don’t know what could happen if Meg plays that kind of games.”

“Yes, but…”

“It doesn’t matter, Dean,” Castiel had replied, popping his head out of the window. “I can see what they’re doing from here without any… oh.”

He’d sat back in his place, with his face beet red.

“They’re putting on their pajamas,” he’d explained. Sam had hit his head against the car’s glove compartment.

“Okay, yeah, maybe we don’t need to know what’s going on right inside of the room,” Dean had accepted. “But we’re still sticking around just in case.”

So now it was three in the morning, Sam was tired as all hell, Cas was slumbering in the backseat and Dean was drinking some of the strongest coffee Sam had the misfortune to ever smell. For the tenth time in the night, he tried to convince Dean to get out of there before someone noticed their car and call the police.

“Look, they turned off the lights, they’ve obviously gone to sleep,” he said. “Let’s go home so we can do the same.”

“Maybe they’ll turn them on again,” Dean replied, watching the darkened window like a hawk. “They’ve done it before.”

“Maybe they were telling ghost stories and needed the lights off for ambient,” Sam suggested. “You know, because that’s the sort of thing that normally happens in a sleepover.”

Dean still didn’t look convinced.

“Dean, come on,” Sam groaned. “Mrs. Walker has our numbers. I’m sure that if something happens, she’ll call us right away.”

Dean hesitated a moment longer, and then, to Sam’s relief, he turned on the engine.

“Yeah, okay,” he muttered. “I guess we could all get some rest before we have to pick the little hellish princess tomorrow.”

“Thank you!” Sam huffed.

If they had driven away thirty seconds later, they still could have seen the lights in Peggy’s room turning on again. And if they have waited yet another ten minutes, they could have seen the backdoor of the Walkers’ home opening, and five little girls sneaking out into the night.

 

* * *

 

“I still cannot believe you’ve convinced me to do this,” Tammy groaned. “Every horror movie ever says that this is a bad idea. This is how you end up decapitated by a serial killer or eaten by a werewolf or something.”

“Oh, come on,” Anita said, with a big grin across her face. “This is exciting, isn’t it?”

Judging by Kate’s face, she probably would have gone with “terrifying as hell”.

“We don’t really have to do this,” she said. “I’m fine really. I don’t believe there’s a monster anymore.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” Meg said, turning on the flashlight as they made their way down the lane. “The moment we’re back there, you’re going to start getting all scaredy-cat again on us. So we better go face your fears once and for all so we can all get some sleep.”

“I’m not a scaredy-cat,” Kate protested, but nobody paid attention to her. Peggy, on her side, was worried about more mundane troubles:

“Let’s make this quick,” she said. “If my mom discovers that we got out of the house this late, we’re going to be in some serious troubles.”

“It’ll take but five minutes,” Meg guaranteed. “We go in, make sure there are no Franken-monsters walking about, and then we go back.”

“Do we really need to…?” Kate began saying, but by that time everyone was crossing the streets.

It took them about fifteen minutes of walking through the empty streets to arrive at the house. It looked quite normal, to be honest: except for the overgrown weed and the broken tree in the front yard, there was not much that indicated the house was abandoned. The glasses in the window were full, and the door wasn’t hanging on its hinges. It definitely didn’t look like the site where a gruesome murder and some necromancy had taken place.

“Oh, we came, we saw it,” Tammy said. “Can we go back now?”

“Don’t tell me you’re scared too,” Anita mocked her.

“Uh… yeah?” Tammy admitted. She was of the firm opinion denial led nowhere. “Maybe there’s no Franken-monster thing in there, but there could be junkies squatting or some shit. The floor could be covered in hypodermic needles full of sickness, for all we know.”

“There are no squatters,” Anita said. “My aunt’s company would have driven them away.”

“But what if they never found out they were?” Peggy argued.

“Okay, this is getting ridiculous,” Meg interrupted. “Are you coming or what?”

The girls looked around only to discover that Meg had jumped the gate and made her way to the door. Now she was waiting for them with a defying crooked eyebrow and a hand on the doorknob like breaking into abandoned, possibly haunted houses was something she did on daily basis.

“How did she get all the way there?” Tammy asked.

“She’s fast,” Peggy shrugged and also jumped the gate, because she just knew Meg wouldn’t let it rest until they’d seen the interior of the house. Anita still thought this was all pretty much the coolest idea ever, so of course she jumped too.

Tammy and Kate stayed right where they were.

“We’ll keep watch,” Tammy said.

“Yes!” Kate approved. “That’s a great idea! We’ll stay right here and let you know if somebody comes.”

“Have it your way,” Meg shrugged. “But you know; the sentinels are always the first to die.”

Kate was visibly shaking in her hoodie when she jumped the gate. After a few seconds, Tammy sighed and reluctantly followed them as well.

“This better not get us killed,” she warned them.

Meg grinned. Peggy had the impression she was about to say something along the lines of her being unkillable (it wouldn’t be the first time), but she simply turned on the flashlight and pushed the door. Peggy was not surprised to see it opening. Locks didn’t seem to be much of a problem for Meg when she wanted something.

“This place doesn’t have an alarm, does it?” she asked.

“I don’t think so,” Anita shrugged. “Auntie’s always complaining about how expensive they are, and besides, there’s nothing to steal in here.”

“All the more reason to think there might be some homeless junkie squatting in here,” Tammy muttered.

“Well, if there is, I’m sure they already heard us and are coming at us with their rusty knives up,” Meg said, casually. Kate suffocated a sob, but she didn’t suggest they turned back again. She had the feeling it would be useless anyway.

The girls hesitated at the doorway for a second or two. Then, someone (Peggy would have bet it had been Meg) pushed Anita in, who dragged Tammy with them, who pushed Peggy… and next thing they knew, all five of them were stumbling in.

The interior looked pretty normal, if a little dusty. There was nothing but an open space with some peeling paint on the walls. There were no junkies around, and no carpets stained with blood, which Meg was the first to note was really disappointed in terms of haunted houses.

“Well, of course they couldn’t leave the stained carpet here,” Tammy said. “It was probably evidence against the case.”

“Speaking of which,” Peggy said, adopting what Meg called her “Nancy Drew voice”. “Does any of you know what happened to that poor woman?”

“I’m thinking maybe they put her away in a mental hospital?” Anita suggested. “I mean, she obviously snapped. If there was no creature in the basement, that means she just went mad and killed her husband for no reason.”

“B-but… but… what about the experiments?” Kate asked. “You said there were… like… body parts and…”

“Oh, yeah, that,” Tammy remembered. “Probably the press exaggerating some things.”

And that was when Peggy began to think that Meg had been right all along about the girls making it all up beforehand. She opened her mouth to suggest they left when Kate practically jumped and grabbed her arm.

“Did you hear that?” she asked in a horrified whisper.

Peggy was about to ask what, but then she did hear it: there were scratching noises all over the second floor, like someone was dragging their nails along the floor boards. It went on for a few tense seconds, and then stopped.

“What was that?” Tammy asked. Her calm voice finally showed some signs of cracking.

“Rats, maybe?” Anita suggested. She hugged herself. “I should tell Auntie about those. And how cold this house is.”

Now that she mentioned it, it was pretty cold for an August night. Peggy trembled slightly inside her hoodie. Meg, who had been walking around, probably looking for the door to the basement, stopped in her tracks.

“Huh,” she muttered. She took out her cellphone from her pocket and pressed a couple of buttons. “Hey, loser, did I wake you? Do you have your computer near you? I need you to check something for me. It’s about a house right here on Peggy’s neighborhood. I want to know if something horrible or violent happened there,” she passed him the address and waited, tapping her foot on the floor impatiently. “Aha. Aha. Murder-suicide you say? Interesting. Nope, no reason. Okay, thanks, bye.” She hanged up and looked at her friends. “Okay, guys, let’s head out, excursion’s over.”

“What?”

“But we didn’t even go to the basement!”

“Hey, if there’s no monster down there, it’s probably really dark and rat-infested,” Meg pointed out. “Do you really want to go down there? No? Didn’t think so. Let’s go before…”

Kate was all too pleased with that change of plans, because she practically bounced towards the door… right before it closed practically on its face.

“Oh,” she muttered. “That… what a weird wind we’re having, right?” She laughed nervously and tried the doorknob. When it was clear it wouldn’t move, she started pulling with all her strength. “Come on, open. Open you stupid door!” she screamed.

Peggy grabbed her by the shoulders and held her against her body.

“Is this one of your pranks?” she asked with a severe look at Meg. “Because it’s not funny, Meg. Stop it.”

“Trust me,” Meg said, still calm but moving her eyes in every direction like she was expecting something to move. “I wish I could.”

“Wait, what do you mean…?”

Tammy never finished her question: a violent, invisible force threw her across the room. She landed on her back with a shout, and when Anita tried to run towards her, she tripped, seemingly against nothing and fell face down on the floor.

“Meg!” Peggy shouted.

Meg gritted her teeth and advanced towards the middle of the room.

“Hey, you disembodied ass!” she shouted. “Why don’t you mess with someone your own size?”

The flashlight had fallen on the floor, so the room was dark. Yet, through the glimmer of the streetlamps coming in through the window, Peggy thought she saw two things: the first, Meg’s eyes had once again become of that terrifying pitch black they sometimes had. Second, there was a figure that wasn’t there before standing right in front of her.

Anita saw it too, because she shouted, and crawled away to the corner where Tammy had fallen, and they hugged each other in fear. Kate was trembling violently in her cousin’s arms, with her eyes shut tight and muttering to herself.

“It’s a nightmare, it’s just a nightmare, I’m going to wake up now, I want to wake up now!”

Peggy didn’t think they were going to wake up any time soon. Mostly because everything around them was too solidly real.

And second, because the figure Meg was confronting had become clearer: it was a man, dressed with a white hospital robe. There was a long, red cut along his neck, and his face was contorted in an expression of pure rage. A scalpel glimmered in his hand when he raised it… and then promptly put it down, stabbing Meg right in the neck.

Three horrified shouts echoed in the living room. There was blood now, so much blood coming out, dripping down Meg’s shirt, but she was still standing defiantly in front of the ghostly doctor. She pulled the scalpel out and dropped it. It disappeared before touching the floor.

“Come on,” she coughed, splattering even more blood. The droplets seemed to go right through the ghostly doctor. “Is that the best you got?”

The doctor jumped at Meg, his hands curved in clutches, his eyes maddened with fury. He grabbed Meg by the neck, and lifted her in the air, but Meg just stared at him with her unblinking black eyes, not even trying to struggle to escape his grip.

Peggy felt the floor underneath her trembling violently, and at first she thought it was just her knees giving in. She fell down, with Kate holding on tight to her, and watched as the lamp above their heads started swinging from side to side. That’s when she realized it was the whole house that was shaking and creaking, causing some fine debris to rain down on them.

The doctor let go off Meg, who landed on her feet and advanced towards him with a hand extended.

“Did you really think you could take on me, you pathetic shadow?” she said, with a voice so deep and so threatening Peggy barely recognized her. “Return to the void you escaped from, now!”

The ghost stepped backwards, his mouth opening wide in a silent, desperate scream. His figured flickered a couple of times, and then vanished, leaving behind a slight but nauseating smell of rotten eggs. When Meg turned around and approached Peggy, she realized the smell was actually coming from her.

Her eyes had never looked so dark. They weren’t simply black anymore, they were… bottomless.

“We need to get out of here now,” Meg said. She blinked and her eyes went back to normal. “I cast him out, but I don’t know if he’ll return.”

Peggy still didn’t move, and she didn’t let go off of Kate (who was now sobbing quietly). She was too terrified. She had always known Meg and Castiel were different. She’d just never wanted to think about just how different they really were. She now had the terrible suspicion that what she’d mistaken for some extraordinary humans were actually never that at all. They were some sort of unimaginable creatures wearing human skin.

Almost as if she had read her thoughts, Meg said:

“Pegs, I’ll explain everything later, okay? We have to go.”

She turned towards Anita and Tammy, who were still holding onto each other, paralyzed.

“Everybody, come on!” Meg shouted, exasperated. “We need to get out, right now!”

Peggy didn’t think they would have reacted if it wasn’t for the honk and the headlights lighting up the window. Anita and Tammy were on their feet right before the tier screech outside, and this time, when they pulled the doorknob, it opened without any resistance.

Peggy wasn’t surprised (when she finally could convince Kate it was safe to move now) to discover it was one of Meg “uncles” that had parked their car outside the house.

“What the hell?!” Dean asked, when four shocked and scared little girls practically tackled him, all speaking at the same time about the house, the quake, the stabbing, the… “Okay, okay, everybody calm down and get in the car. Is anybody hurt?”

Peggy turned towards Meg. Her hoodie had a dark stain of the blood she had spilled, but the wound in her neck had sealed like it had never been there at all. Even the finger-shaped bruises were disappearing. She was completely tranquil in the middle of chaotic panic that had overrun her friends.

“Angry ghost,” she said simply, as she crossed the garden and climbed into the car. “You should really get on with the salting and burning of this one.”

She adjusted her seat belt and waited in patient silence until Dean started the car.


	16. Confessions

“I cannot believe you, Meg!”

“What were you thinking?!”

“Alone, out there in the middle of the night! What if something happened to you?!”

Peggy, Anita, Tammy and Kate were looking down at the floor, properly ashamed as they were being chastised, but Meg held her uncles’ gaze almost as unblinkingly as she had held the ghost’s.

“I should call your parents!” Mrs. Walker was saying. “I should call them to pick you up right now, and…”

“You put your friends in danger!” Sam shouted. “How could you be so reckless?”

“Well, how was I supposed to know the place was _actually_ haunted?” Meg protested. “And besides I tried getting them out of there the moment I realize!”

A heavy silence fell in the living room. Mrs. Walker looked utterly confused, as did all the girls when they realized Meg just knew exactly what had happened while they still had collectively no clue.

“Didn’t I, Peggy?” Meg asked, looking for some sort of support.

“To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what happened,” Peggy whispered.

“And you revealed the reality of the supernatural to them!” Dean added. “Great, that’s just great.”

“What’s the big deal?” Meg groaned. “You just get Castiel to touch them in the forehead for two seconds, and they’ll forget all about it.”

Castiel had been quietly leaned against a wall up until that point, in which everybody turned to stare at him.

“Uhm… I know this is an option we’ve had in the past,” he said, fidgeting with his fingers. “But I don’t feel comfortable forcibly erasing our friend’s memories.”

“I’ll like the memory wipe!” Kate said. “If that’s an option.”

“Me too,” Anita added.

“And me,” Tammy agreed.

“Perhaps don’t erase everything,” Meg suggested. “Just the part about the ghost and me getting stabbed.”

“ _You got stabbed?!_ ” Mrs. Walker shouted. She was white as a sheet, and clearly about to pass out.

“And maybe that last part too,” Peggy requested.

Castiel hesitated a moment longer, and then he gently touched Anita’s head. He did the same thing with Kate, Tammy and Mrs. Walker they all blinked confused for a second.

Then Mrs. Walker started again:

“You have no idea _who_ could have seen you out there! If Meg’s uncle hadn’t arrived…!”

“Yes, speaking of that,” Meg frowned. “How did you guys get there se fast all the way from the bunker?”

“Bunker?” Peggy repeated.

“Home,” Meg corrected herself. “I meant home.”

The Winchesters and Castiel exchanged guilty looks, but that was the last thing in Peggy’s mind. She was alternatively looking at her friends. After almost eight years on friendship (which, at that point, was more than half of her life), she figured she had the right to ask:

“Guys,” she said, very quietly. “Can you tell me what’s going on?”

Meg and Castiel looked worried, and turned to their “uncles”, as if to ask permission. Sam raised his hands.

“Your call, kids,” he said simply.

 

* * *

 

After Tammy, Anita, Kate and Mrs. Walker went to sleep, Meg grabbed Peggy’s hand and gently pushed the window open. Castiel was sitting in the rooftop, with his knees hugged to his chest. Peggy didn’t even bother asking how he’d got there and didn’t hesitate to go with him and Meg. She sat down by their side and in a whisper, so as not to wake the others, they explained to her who they were and what they did.

It was a lot to take in.

“So… you’re… you’re a demon?”

“Yeah, but don’t worry about it,” Meg sighed. “The evilest thing I do these days is hiding the professors’ chalks when they’re not looking. I’m sort of a disgrace.”

“And you’re an angel?”

Castiel nodded gravely.

“Do you have wings?”

“Yes, but you can’t see them.”

“Huh,” Peggy said. “That explains why things fall around you a lot. You’re knocking them down all the time.”

They stayed in silence for a long time until Peggy came up with another question.

“So you’re not really cousins,” she deduced. They shook their head. “Your uncles?”

“They’re humans,” Meg replied. “A very particular kind of them, really, but humans. And not really our uncles.”

“That I figured,” Peggy said. She would have liked to laugh, but she was still too shocked for it. “And your cats?”

“They’re just cats.”

“Do you really live in an underground bunker?” Peggy asked. “Is that why you’ve never invited me to your house?”

“It’s not even a cool underground bunker,” Meg said. “It’s full of dusty books and nerd stuff. It does have a dungeon, though.”

Castiel cleared his throat loudly, because he wasn’t sure Peggy was ready to know about the gorier, more dangerous side of the world they had accidentally dragged her to.

“So ghosts and vampires and werewolves… all of that is true?” Peggy continued asking.

“Yes, but they don’t spend so much time brooding and falling in love with human girls as they do in books,” Castiel clarified.

“I knew I shouldn’t have given you those novels,” Meg sighed. She put a hand on the shoulder of the paralyzed Peggy. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Peggy said, sincerely. “I mean, I always knew there was something different about you, guys. I just didn’t imagine it was… _so_ different.”

She took a deep breath, and then showed a big smile of perfectly aligned teeth.

“I’m going to be okay,” she concluded. “As long as you don’t tell me that Mrs. Periwinkle is some sort of strange creature too.”

Castiel opened his mouth, but Meg pinched him in the arm to keep him quiet.

 

* * *

 

The last week of August came, and Rowena decided it’d be best if she left with it. So the Winchesters and their little monsters stood in front of the bunker’s stairs, eagerly waiting for her to finish kissing them all in the cheek and saying her goodbyes.

“Well, this has been really fun!” she said, as she picked up her bag in one hand that no one remembered her having when she arrived, and no one was really sure when she got, and her son in the other, who was crying out loud without signs of ever quieting down.

“Don’t wanna go!” he protested. “Wanna stay! Momma, let’s stay!”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, take him away,” Meg muttered under her breath, covering her ears.

“I want to thank you for your hospitality!” Rowena continued, shouting to make herself heard over Crowley’s sobbing. “You have been nothing but marvelous towards us!”

“Really? Because I’m pretty sure Meg has tried to poison Crowley a couple of times when we weren’t looking,” Sam pointed out.

“It was for the greater good,” Meg muttered, with a thousand yards stare into the distance.

“You two are growing so fast,” Rowena continued, ruffling Castiel’s hair. “I’m so glad to see that everything turned out alright in the end.”

“That’s a very relative statement,” Castiel said. “I suffer from hunger practically every moment I am awake, and I have strange, painful red dots sprouting on my face and my back.”

“That’s called acne, Cas,” Dean pointed out.

“Oh, just get yourself a good cleaning cream, and you should be perfectly fine,” Rowena promised him. “The spell should only work for another decade or so, so you should the changes while you go through them.”

“Wait, what does ‘or so’ mean?” Sam asked, frowning. “You don’t know exactly when they will stop aging?”

Rowena blinked a couple of times, and then she smiled wide.

“We should do this again next summer!” she said, blatantly avoiding the question. “I’m sure Fergus would love that,” she added, pulling from the little demon’s hand towards the door. Crowley, however, was decided to stand his ground.

“No!” he said, as he refused to move.

“Oh, Fergus, come on,” Rowena insisted. “I know you’re anxious about kindergarten starting, but it’s going to be fun! You will meet other kids, learn how to be social and make useless macaroni art!”

“You’re sending him to kindergarten?” Dean asked, already making a mental list of the things they would need should a second apocalypse begin.

“Well, schooling seemed to work wonders for yours,” Rowena said, still pulling Crowley towards the door in vain. “If only… he’d just…”

Her hand slipped away, and the second he was free, Crowley turned around and ran directly towards Meg.

“Whore!” he shouted wrapping his little arms around her leg. “Love you!”

“Get it off me, GET IT OFF ME!” Meg demanded with a disgusted grimace.

Castiel grabbed Crowley by the neck of his shirt and almost threw him in his mother’s grip. Then he wrapped an arm around Meg’s shoulders, protectively, narrowing his eyes at the little demon, who resumed his crying and whining the moment he was separated from Meg.

“There we go,” Rowena said, calmly tucking Crowley under her arm. “Don’t forget to write to me!” she requested as she climbed the stairs juggling with her bag and her son. “I will see you all soon! Have a great school year!”

The door shut behind her and the four inhabitants of the bunker sighed in unison.

“Do you hear that?” Dean asked, and the other three turned towards him. “It’s the beautiful sound… of silence.”

He closed his eyes like there was nothing in the world he would like more than to enjoy that symphony.

“School starts in three days,” Sam said, and Meg wailed in horror, making Dean jump so high he almost hit his head against the ceiling.

 

* * *

 

It was not strange, in those nights when the heat was so high it was torture, that one or two of the brothers couldn’t sleep as peacefully as they had learned to do during those five years. So Dean wasn’t all that surprised when he got up that night to get a glass of water (or a bottle of beer, same difference), and found Sam sitting in the library with some books spread out in front of him.

“Hey,” Dean asked, sitting by his side. “Can’t sleep?”

“Rudy had an emergency,” Sam explained, rubbing his temples. “Some kind of ancient, unkillable god.”

“Ah, those are always fun,” Dean commented, putting his feet up in the table. Sam was so concentrated on what he was doing he didn’t even scold him about it. He kept turning the pages in silent while Dean chugged down his beer. “Do you ever miss it?” the older Winchester asked, suddenly.

“Miss what?” Sam asked, not really paying attention.

“Being on the road,” Dean explained. “You and me, tracking down whatever evil thing was making a mess in those little quiet towns. I mean, we used to be the most badass, fearsome hunters on God’s green earth. We used to be the thing monsters told horror stories about. Now we have two teenagers and we’re BFFs with the local witch.”

“Our two teenagers are eldritch horrors that could obliterate the entire town if they wake up in a mood, Dean,” Sam pointed out. “I’d say we have more than our hands full with that.”

Dean reckoned he was right and took a swig of his beer.

“But I do kind of miss going on road trips,” Sam admitted, after a pause. “You remember that time we took the kids to Lake Michigan and it turned out the lighthouse was haunted?”

“Oh, yeah,” Dean chuckled. “Good times. We should do that again some time.”

“We should do it next summer,” Sam proposed. “I mean, Meg and Cas are starting their sophomore year. Who knows how long we have left before they are old enough to go out into the world?”

“That’s a scary thought,” Dean nodded, taking another swig. “Besides, it’ll be really funny if we just leave without telling anybody. Do you imagine Rowena showing up and nobody being here?”

“Maybe we could leave a message right outside the door,” Sam suggested. “ _‘Sorry, back in September’_.”

Dean could just picture Rowena’s face perfectly, and he burst out laughing. Sam laughed as well, and for a moment, everything was just fine.

Then Dean remembered:

“Oh, shit, we never did get around salting and burning that Lancaster guy.”

Sam raised his head, then back at his books.

“Rudy sounded pretty desperate,” he mused.

“He’ll be fine,” Dean guaranteed him. “Come on, let’s go dig up a grave! For old times’ sake.”

Sam hesitated a moment longer, and then he closed his books in one go.

“What the hell,” he said. “The unkillable god will probably still be there when we get back.

“That’s the spirit!” Dean said, and he stood up to put on some pants. Because it was one thing to get caught desecrating a tomb, it was another thing entirely to get caught in his underwear desecrating a tomb.

 

* * *

 

The bunker was eerily silent by the time Castiel slid down the hall and into Meg’s room. She was already in bed, and he figured she must have been sleeping, but she moved right away when she felt him lying down by her side.

“Hey,” she said, turning around towards him. She usually had her eyes all black at night. Castiel didn’t know exactly why. It was probably a demon thing.

“Hey,” Castiel muttered, passing an arm around her waist to bring her closer to him. “How long do we have?”

“I heard Sam and Dean leaving earlier,” Meg said.

“Where could they have gone?”

“Who cares?”

She started leaving butterfly kisses: on his cheek, on the tip of his nose, on the side of his lips. At first Castiel closed his eyes and enjoyed the touch, because it was so rare that Med was this tender with him. But when her kisses went along his jaw and then down at his collar bone, he startled. Suddenly, he realized Meg’s body was so close he could feel every one of her curves against him.

“Meg?” he called, a little nervous. “Are you…? Should we be doing this?”

“You don’t want to?” she asked, but she still had her face against his neck. Her breath tickled him, and he shivered.

“It’s not that I don’t want, exactly,” Castiel said, trying to be logical, which was really hard to do with Meg’s fingers finding their way up his shirt. “There are a lot of things to consider. You remember what Sam and Dean told us? We should be careful…”

“Who are you taking me for, Clarence?” Meg asked, a little annoyed at his lack of faith. “I have condoms.”

“Oh,” Castiel said. He thought about asking how she’d got them, but he figured he wasn’t really going to get a direct answer. “Then it’s okay, I guess.”

It was slow. Clumsy. Castiel suddenly felt like his legs were too long, was not entirely sure what to do with his hands, but Meg was patient and clear in her instructions. After a while, however, they found a rhythm, and then everything was wonderful. They didn’t say a lot, but Castiel could see the smile in Meg’s face, and that was more than enough to make him smile.

Castiel fell asleep with his fingers tangled in Meg’s hair, and neither of them remembered to wake up early and get him back to his room until there was a knock on the door, and they both got up startled.

“Meg?” Sam’s voice called.

“Shit,” Meg muttered, and then a little louder. “Don’t come in, I’m not dressed!”

“Okay,” Sam replied. “I just wanted to ask if you knew where Castiel is.”

“How am I supposed to know that? He’s probably up walking through the forest or doing something equally nerdy,” Meg replied, in a perfectly annoyed tone could have probably fooled someone who didn’t know her better. Sam, however, was pretty certain by this point that Castiel was in that room, but he was not about to burst open the door to test that theory. He liked his physical integrity the way it was right now.

“Okay, well, you need to get up and get dressed,” he instructed. “We have to go shopping for school supplies for you two.”

“I do need a new backpack,” Castiel said out loud.

Meg gasped and hit him with a pillow. Sam decided to just ignore that.

“So if you see him, tell him that,” he concluded, before walking away promising himself it was the last time they left those two alone at home. Also, he was so glad he left those condoms where Meg could easily steal them.


	17. Competition

Summer ended way sooner than Meg would have liked, and the return to school was not easy on her mood.

“Come on, Meg,” Castiel had to shake her several times the first day of school. “We can’t be late.”

“Go away,” Meg muttered, grabbing a pillow and covering her head with it. “It’s the first day. They’re not going to teach anything important.”

Castiel sighed, resigned and dragged himself to the kitchen. Two minutes later, Dean walked into the room.

“Young lady, don’t make me spray you with holy water,” he threatened her. “Get out of bed, right now.”

“No,” Meg said, pulling the covers over her head. Dean would have tried to get to her and shake her, but _Mephistopheles_ was lying right next to her head, staring at Dean, almost as if he was saying: “ _Go ahead, make my day. I’ll turn you into my scratching pole._ ”

So Dean left the room without any more luck than Castiel.

“Meg,” Sam said a few minutes later. “Come on, I know school can be exhausting.”

“Shut up, you nerd, you love school,” Meg grumbled, rolling over herself so Sam would have to have that conversation with her back.

Sam sighed heavily and sat on the bed next to her.

“Do you have cramps?” he asked, sympathetically.

“Fuck you,” Meg muttered. “It’s really dickish of you to assume that because I’m not in a good mood then I must be PMSing.”

Sam waited patiently.

“Yes, I have cramps,” Meg admitted in the end.

“I’ll get you some pills,” Sam promised, standing up. “But you know it’s not going to help if you stay right there wallowing on your misery. You should get up and wreak some havoc in school. That always cheers you up.”

Meg raised her head, blinking.

“And you know what you’re going to see this year that you didn’t last?” Sam continued. “Freshmen. All innocent and naïve walking down the halls of your school. Don’t you wanna show them who’s boss?”

“I guess,” Meg said. She was halfway into sitting by now.

“Come on, then,” Sam encouraged her. “Those fourteen-year-olds aren’t going to terrorize themselves.”

And he walked out of the room, very satisfied with his own pep talk. Meg sat down with a grimace and figured she wasn’t in conditions of terrorizing anybody that day, because she would most likely just end up straight up killing them. And the Winchesters could stand a prank that got out of hand or two, but she figured that murder was where they drew the line.

 

* * *

 

The ambient at the school was way too cheerful for Meg’s taste. Realistically, she knew at least three quarter of the students had to be feeling as miserable and unhappy as she was, but they were doing an excellent job at pretending to be otherwise.

“Why are they all smiling, Castiel?” she asked. “Don’t they realize they’re wasting their precious youth, the only chance they’ll have at enjoying life with wide-eyed innocence? Don’t they know they will be imprisoned here for years to come until they had been completely stripped from their joy and will to live?”

“You’re particularly bleak today,” the angel replied, as they stopped next to her locker.

“I almost pity them,” Meg answered, cringing. “This is horrible.”

“Hey, guys,” Peggy greeted them as she walked down the hall hand in hand with Gary.

“What’s up?”

“Meg is having a bad day,” Castiel informed them. Meg growled slowly to indicate it was true.

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” Peggy said. “Oh, but I heard that Coach Smith took an early retirement and we’re getting someone new as our P. E. teacher. You hated Coach Smith, didn’t you? Aren’t you glad he gave up on torturing students with his irrational physical tests because that was the only thing that made him feel happy and now he’ll become a bitter old man resenting the young ones he couldn’t psychologically scar for life for the physical ineptitude?”

“You girls have a strange opinion of how a professor’s mind works,” Gary commented, but that was all he said. Just like Peggy, he was beginning to accept there were certain things about Meg and Castiel he’d never understand.

Before Meg could make another dark comment about everything must come to an end, Tammy and Anita ran up towards them with smiles on their faces that further irritated the little demon.

“Guys, you have to hear this!” Tammy said, while Anita gave little jumps like she couldn’t contain her excitement. Or like she needed to pee really bad; Meg couldn’t decide which one. “The new coach…”

“The new coach has lowered the ages to apply for the cheerleading squad!” Anita screamed. “We were going to try next year, but now we can try this year, and it’s going to be so great!”

“Congratulations,” Meg sighed. “You can fruitlessly shout and jump and cheer for a team that never wins anything.”

It was like she had just popped the little balloon of happiness inside Anita’s chest.

“You’re more Wednesday Addams than usual,” she commented.

“No, but she has a point,” Gary said. “Our football team sucks.”

“Well, who cares about that?” Tammy shrugged. “The cheerleading squad’s going to be fun! You did artistic gymnastics when you were younger, didn’t you, Peggy? Why don’t you try with us?”

“I don’t know, that was like when I was like nine, and I didn’t last a lot,” Peggy said. “I fell off the ball and my wrist hasn’t been the same ever since.”

“You would look cute in a cheerleading uniform, though,” Gary said. In truth, he would find Peggy in whatever she wore, but that was sort of implied.

“So when do you say are these tryouts?” Peggy asked.

“Next week,” Anita said. “You should try too, Meg.”

“I don’t want to cheer people up,” Meg groaned, as she closed her locker with enough force to make all the others in the row vibrate. “I want to destroy them.”

“That’s a very unhealthy attitude, young lady,” someone intervened. They all turned around to find a man in shorts with a whistle hanging around his neck, from which they deduced he was the new coach.

“I am not healthy,” Meg replied, and with her pale face, the black circles under her eyes and her hair so messy it was obvious she had not even attempted to brush it that morning, no one was really arguing that. The coach, on his part, was a muscular man in his forties that didn’t seem to have a single ounce of fat in his body, and he immediately showed Meg a smile.

“You’re aggressive. I like that,” the coach commented. “I like that. If you ever want to do something productive with those destructive impulses, perhaps you should try out for the football team.”

He happily handed her a flyer before walking away.

“The football team?” Tammy repeated.

“Is that allowed?” Gary asked. “For a girl, I mean.”

“I guess a girl could,” Peggy said. “But Meg is a… special… person,” she finished, when Meg glared at her. It was still hard for Peggy to remember not everyone was aware of the deal with Meg and Castiel.

“Whatever,” Meg said, crumpling the flyer into a ball. “Like I wanted to join a team of losers.”

She threw it over her shoulder (and nobody dared to say a word about littering, because that would for sure mean a certain death), but before she could walk away with her friends to her first class, somebody shouted at them.

“What’s with you, Masters?” Kyle Thompson said, waving the flyer. “Are you going to join for the football team?”

“Cut it out, Kyle,” Gary said.

“And you’re hanging out with these idiots?” Kyle added, sticking his tongue out to his former friend. “You used to be fun, Gary, now you’re just whipped.”

“Leave him alone,” Castiel growled. Kyle stepped back, because he wasn’t a complete idiot. He knew about those kids reputations and he knew it was best not to mess with them. But before he ran away like the coward he actually was, he couldn’t help but to throw one last taunt.

“In any case, a chick could never make it to the team,” he said. “Much less a skinny one like you.”

Meg turned around, and that’s when everyone scrambled out of the way, except for Castiel, who remained close because it wasn’t the Kyle didn’t deserve to have his limbs ripped, it was like Meg could get in a lot of trouble if she managed it.

“What did you say to me?” she asked, crooking an eyebrow.

Kyle probably saw his entire life flash before his eyes, because he swallowed loudly and put his hands up defensively.

“Come on, Masters, it was just a joke,” he said. “You know, because… you’re a girl… and you’re… thin…”

“Oh, and you think that means I’m not strong enough to make it to the team?” Meg asked, taking another step towards him. Kyle moved back until he was up against a wall, looking around for help or some way to escape, but that was impossible, because Meg was so close he could see how the white in her eyes disappeared underneath an inscrutable darkness. “Is that what you’re saying, that I can’t make it?”

“N-No…” Kyle stammered. Meg raised her fist and he covered his face with a whimper.

The wall by his side shuddered, and some debris fell to the floor. When Kyle looked again, he saw a perfectly round hole the size of Meg’s fist on the painting.

“Anything to add?” Meg asked, with what Peggy had come to know as the Crooked Eyebrow of Doom.

Kyle clearly didn’t, because he left without another world.

“How did she do that?” Anita whispered to Tammy.

“Maybe she goes to boot camp?”

Meg picked up the flyer from where it ended on the floor.

“Clarence, remind me to let Sam and Dean know I’m coming home late tomorrow,” she announced. “I’m going to the tryouts for the football team.”

“Two seconds ago you said you didn’t want to,” Castiel pointed out, tiredly.

“Yes,” Meg replied, and pointed a finger in the direction Kyle had run. “But _he_ said I couldn’t!”

 

* * *

 

Castiel stayed for the tryouts as well, both to support Meg and to make sure nobody died in the process. He sat in the bleachers with Tammy, Anita and Peggy.

“So Gary is trying out too?” Tammy asked.

“Yep, he didn’t really want to,” Peggy replied. “But his dad forced him to.”

“That’s really awful that parents try to control what their kids do,” Anita commented.

“Yeah,” Tammy nodded. “Oh, get this: my mom told me she’ll buy me a car for my birthday if I make to the cheerleading team!”

Castiel didn’t want to ask how that was any different from what Gary’s dad was doing, because he was pretty sure he wouldn’t understand the explanation anyway.

“There they come!”

The new coach (who, they had come to learn was named Stevenson) ran into the field with a net full of footballs followed by at least a dozen boys that were basically mountains of muscles. Castiel recognizing them as the official team, but it was hard to distinguish them from the aspiring members, because they were all just as tall and bulky. Next to them, Gary looked very thin, and Meg was positively tiny. Castiel noticed that all the boys were side-eyeing her with suspicion, like they weren’t entirely sure what exactly was she doing there. Meg was looking ahead, pointedly ignoring them all.

“Very well,” Coach Stevenson said with that voice that could probably be heard over thousands of cheering parents on game night. “Let’s see what you got. Run back to the line, and prepare to catch and throw.”

Meg, Gary and four other boys obeyed while the coach distributed footballs between the official members. One of them approached him to talk and gesticulate, pointing towards Meg. The coach shut him up with a very audible: “Because I say so! Now go throw that ball!”

The boy obviously grumbled, but he still went to stand in front of Meg. The coach blew the whistle and they all started throwing the balls at their potential new teammates. It started well enough, but then Castiel noticed a trend in which the throws were a lot more aggressive, and a lot more difficult: they threw them over their head, on the side, almost as they didn’t want them to catch them… when they weren’t throwing directly _at_ them with all the strength they got.

“What are they trying to do?”

“Maybe see if they can handle complicated passes?” Peggy speculated.

The only one who was still throwing moderately well was the player who was passing the ball to Meg. All the others seemed decided to completely destroy their opponents: the balls came faster than they could protect themselves, with their hands up pathetically so that they wouldn’t be hit in the stomach, the legs…

One ball landed directly on Gary’s face, making him fall on the ground. Peggy jumped from her seat with a gasp.

“Hey!” Meg screamed, and then she threw her ball at the face of the boy who was passing the ball to Gary. It crashed right against his nose, and the boy collapsed heavily. 

Coach Stevenson blew the whistle again.

“What was that, Masters?” he asked.

“He started it!” Meg replied.

Gary stood up, as a bruise started forming on the side of his face. The other boy got up holding his nose, which was bleeding profusely.

“Coach, look what she did!” he screamed, offended.

The coach was indeed looking at what Meg had done.

“Impressive,” he said in the end. “Can you kick as hard as you pass, Masters?”

“Coach!”

“Boyd, take Andrew to the infirmary,” the coach said, without taking another look at him.

“I am Boyd!” the bleeding boy protested.

“Well, then, Andrew, take Boyd to the infirmary.”

Andrew, who turned out to be the boy who was making passes at Meg, picked up his friend and ran with him out of the field. Castiel couldn’t be sure, but he thought he looked almost relieved.

“Well, can you?” the coach asked Meg as if there had been no interruption at all.

“Just point in which direction you want me to kick,” Meg shrugged.

The coach tried to convince the other boys to hold the ball for Meg, but none of them wanted anywhere near her. In the end, Gary volunteered.

“Just try not to kick my fingers,” he said, with a grimace.

“I’ll make no such promise,” Meg replied.

Gary took a deep breath and leaned next to the ball. Meg stepped back a little, then she run towards him. Castiel didn’t think she kicked the ball just as hard she could have, but it still flew over the goal post and into one of the school’s window, which was crashed spectacularly. Coincidentally, that was the infirmary’s window, and it landed directly on the back of Boyd’s head, knocking him down for the second time that day. Nobody could prove if that was Meg’s plan all along or not.

The coach was elated.

“You’re in!” he told her. “You’re on the official team from now on! We’ll get you a shirt and everything!”

“But what about us?” the other applicants asked. They all looked terribly offended that a girl had taken over _their_ spots on the team.

“Right,” the coach looked at them almost as he pitied them. “You can be replacements. You'll on the bench, but, hey, it's better than not making it. Cooper, you… uh… we need a waterboy. Do you think you can, uh… throw water bottles?”

“I can do that,” Gary volunteered.

“Perfect, then you’re in,” the coach said.

Nobody was happy with that result, except Meg, who had a smug smile on her face for the rest of the week, and Gary, who was pretty sure that was not what his dad had in mind when he said he should try and join the team, but it didn’t really matter, because waterboys were definitely less prone to personal injury than actual players.

“I’m so glad for you, guys,” Peggy said, as the entire group walked out of the field to look for their bicycles and their rides home.

“Yeah, but I don’t think it’s going to be that easy,” Gary commented. “Did you see the face those guys had? I don’t think they’re going to accept Meg is on the team any time soon.”

“That’s their problem, not mine,” Meg growled.

“Well, I thought it’s very brave of you to defy their expectations,” Castiel said. “I wish there was a way I could support you, Meg.”

Tammy and Anita exchanged a pensive look.


	18. Game

The bleachers were completely crowded and Sam was having a hard time saving Dean, especially when the mom with bleach hair next to him insisted on leaning way too close to him to talk:

“I am so proud of my boy,” she commented, touching Sam’s forearm without any necessity and laughing out loud. “This is his first game and he was very nervous, but I told him he was going to make a great job! Is it yours first game too?”

“Uh… yeah,” Sam muttered, trying to slide away, but his only escape route was blocked by a fat man wearing a “That’s My Boy” shirt underneath his jacket. Luckily for Sam, Dean finally appeared, juggling with extra, extra large hot dogs.

“There you go, Sammy,” he said, shoving one in his brother’s hand and practically pushing the lady out of the way to sit by his side. The woman let out and offended huff, but Dean simply took a bite of his hot dog and stared at her while chewing ostentatiously. “Yes?” he asked.

The mom grimaced with disgust and turned away. Sam couldn’t help the sigh of relief that escape his lips.

“So when does this thing start?” Dean asked, after swallowing.

“Well, it should be starting about… now,” Sam said, and his statement was reinforced by the cheers and screams that came from all around them as a group of girls in cheerleading uniforms entered the field.

It wasn’t hard to locate Castiel among them. He had grown tall and lanky in the past few years, so his messy dark hair stuck out amongst the girls’ heads. He looked positively euphoric in his green and blue inform as he shook his pom-poms keeping perfect synchrony with the rest of the cheerleaders.

“Who the hell allowed his faggot son to join the squad?” asked the fat man next to them, almost choking on his beer with laughter.

Dean’s reaction was automatic. He leaned over Sam, grabbed the man by the jacket and pulled him close so he had no option but to stare at him face to face.

“You got a problem with my kid, pal?” Dean growled, menacingly.

The man was obviously astonished by the reaction, but he tried for courteous retreat.

“No, man, sorry, I didn’t know it was yours,” said the fat man.

“Dean,” Sam warned him. “Not on the first game.”

Dean reluctantly let go of the man’s jacket, but he kept staring at him with murder in his eyes.

It was amazing how fiercely protective he’d become of Cas’ decision. When the angel first arrived at the bunker with a smile on his face and announced he had been accepted in the cheerleading squad, Dean had been baffled, to call it something.

“What?!” he’d screamed. “Cas, why the hell would you do that? Do you have any idea how much you’re gonna get bullied?”

“Let me remind you, Dean, that I am a veteran from the Heavenly Wars,” Castiel had replied. “So the malicious insults of a few teenagers should be easy to handle compared to that. And besides, if my presence in a traditionally female space makes them uncomfortable, perhaps I am not the one who is in the wrong for defying the polarizing gender stereotypes.”

“I have no idea what you just said, but I don’t like your tone,” Dean had said, squinting at him.

Sam could hardly blame him. Since their little monsters had gone through a couple of growth spurts, their sass levels had too and it was hard to tell when they were talking normally and when they were insulting the brothers. Still, he’d felt the need to intervene.

“Leave it, Dean,” he’d said. “He probably just wanted to be supportive of Meg.”

“Why?” Dean had asked, confused.

Meg, who was sprawled on the couch with a magazine more often than not those days, had put it down to cast an indifferent glance at Dean.

“I tried out for the football team,” she’d explained.

“What?” Dean had asked. “Why? Why does nobody tell me about these things anymore?”

“Because we knew you’d react exactly how you’re reacting,” Meg had said, rolling her eyes. Dean had been forced to get some chill afterwards.

“Did you at least get accepted?”

“Uh-huh,” Meg had said, turning her attention back to the magazine.

“Did you use your demonic powers to get accepted?” Dean had asked immediately.

“You can’t prove anything,” she’d answered, turning the page.

So there they were, on the kids’ first game, eating hot dogs and threatening other parents.

Sometimes Sam wondered how his life got so normal yet so incredibly dysfunctional at the same time.

“And here comes the team!” announced the commentator. “Playing local tonight, it’s Carlton Carey High’s football team, the Beavers!”

“Which one’s Meg?” Sam asked. It was hard to distinguish one kid from another with their helmets on, and they were too far away to make out the numbers on their shirts.

“And this is a historical night, ladies and gentlemen: for the first time, the football team counts with a _female_ player,” the commentator continued. “Let’s hope they don’t make a fool of themselves with this decision, because that would be really…”

There was a scream and then acute whistle that made everybody in the bleachers cover their ears.

“Sorry about that,” said the commentator. “My glass of water seems to have exploded. Weird.”

“That’s her,” the brothers determined in unison when they saw a slightly shorter kid casually pointing in the commentator’s booth direction before joining the rest of the team.

“Boy, I sure hope she’s not on her period or something, huh?” the fat man next to Sam commented.

“Do you have a death wish, dude?” Dean said, his eyes darting in the man’s direction.

“What, you’re telling me she’s yours too?” the fat man tried to chuckle but he should’ve known from Dean’s glare that he was treading on thin ice. “Next thing you’re gonna tell is this hunk right here is _your wife._ ”

“That’s it,” Dean said, reaching inside his jacket pocket.

“Dean, come on,” Sam said, putting a hand on his brother’s forearm. “You can’t kill him.”

He turned at the clearly confused fat man and added audibly:

“Not in public.”

The fat man paled and seemed to understand that it was in his best interest to keep his mouth shut.

The game began and it soon became apparent that the Carlton Carey’s High football team wasn’t acting like a team at all. Meg kept running around, completely free and waving her arms for the team to see her, but the other players apparently preferred to make bad pass after bad pass and end up buried underneath a hostile pile of opponents than to include her in any form or way. After a while, it became really ridiculous, ‘cause the other team was winning spectacularly and even the coach was screaming to them “JUST PASS IT TO MASTERS, GODDAMMIT!” over the school’s band music and the cheerleading squad’s rhymes.

“Can you believe these morons?” Sam asked. “They would rather lose than actually let Meg play!”

“Should we stop the bloodbath she’s going to cause afterwards?” Dean said.

“Nah,” Sam said. “They have it coming.”

The mom that had been hitting on Sam earlier looked scandalized that they were talking about bloodbaths and murdering people so casually, but they’d figured a long time ago that if parents suspected they were some sort of serial killers, the other kids would leave Meg and Cas alone. And God knew they needed it, not for their sake, but for the sake of the bullies’ health.

“What the hell is that?” the fat man recovered his courage at some point during the second half of the game. “See, this is what happens when you let girls into the playfield!”

“You listen to me, you stupid son of a bitch…!”

“Dean…” Sam said, putting a hand on his brother’s shoulder to keep him in his seat.

“That’s almost as bad as letting sissies be cheerleaders!”

Sam decided the time for civility had passed, and punched the fat dad in the face so hard he knocked him off the bleacher. The man sat there, staring at Sam incredulous as his nose bled, and stood up ready to pick up a fight. The other parents scattered out of the way, perceiving it was best not to interrupt what was going on.

“Oh, you asked for it,” said the fat dad, oozing with bravado.

He threw a swing in Sam’s direction that the hunter easily blocked, and the next thing he knew, they were rolling among the bleachers, and he was holding the fat man in a chokehold.

“Sam, Sam, kill that guy later!” Dean screamed. “Meg’s got the ball!”

Sam looked up without letting go off the fat dad and realized Dean was right: the shortest player in the field was squirreling out of the reach of the offensive team, who either hesitated to jump on top of a girl or were too stunned by Meg’s quickness to do anything.

“I can’t believe my eyes!” the commentator screamed in his mic. “Masters crosses the offensive line and… TOUCHDOWN!”

Sam released the fat man to wave his fists in the air.

“Yes!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. “That’s our girl!”

“You show them!” Dean added.

After that, the team seemed to get their shit together and began making more passes at Meg, which actually help them recover from the shameful advantage the other team had got. Dean was biting his nails when the coach asked for the time out when there were only five minutes left.

“Well, if they don’t win, at least they’ll lose with some dignity,” Sam said. He was fooling absolutely no one. The fat dad scoffed, but one glance from the brothers was enough to send him back to the brooding silence he had remained in since he narrowly escaped death at Sam’s hands.

“They have to win!” Dean said, like they hadn’t been interrupted at all. “They have… what are the cheerleaders singing?”

Sam pricked his ears up to catch the words:

_Meg, Meg!_

_Hear the bells!_

_Meg, Meg!_

_Give ‘em hell!_

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!” Dean laughed. “I bet you the car that Castiel wrote that one.”

“Your… kids seem to have an awfully close relationship,” the flirty mom commented, eyeing the Winchesters suspiciously.

“Lady, you have no idea,” Dean said. “It’s like a V.C. Andrews book back at home.”

“We gotta keep them locked away separately, otherwise…” Sam shook his head.

The flirty mom stood up to find somewhere else to sit.

“And the teams are back on the field!” the commentator announced. “I’m not gonna lie, this is one of the tensest moments I’ve ever seen. With just enough time on the clock, Carey’s gotta make this free kick worth it.”

Sam just hoped that all the cheating Meg was about to do wasn’t that obvious.

“Compton holds the ball,” announced the commentator. “Oh, and it seems that Masters is going to make the kick. That a strange choice on part of the couch, but no stranger than a grown man playing with My Little Pony’s plushies like I sometimes do when I’m all alone at my house and unable to fall asleep because deep down I’m certain the people who call themselves my friends think I’m weird. Did I just say that out loud?”

Dean snorted.

“Masters goes for it!” the commentator continued, suddenly remembered what his job was. “And… somebody call my mom ‘cause I’m still an insecure little boy, it flies right outside the field! Three points to the Carey’s Beavers! I found out my ex was cheating on me ‘cause she gave me herpes!”

At that point, the commentator could have said he was actually a little green man from Mars sent to collect Earth data for a future invasion and nobody would have taken heed. Everybody was too busy screaming and hugging in celebration.

Meg took off her helmet and raised her fist in the air. Even from that distance, Sam could see her cheeks burning red and how damp her black hair was as she ran towards the cheerleading squad, who managed what the opposing team hadn’t been able to do and tackled her to the ground. When they moved aside, Meg was sitting on Castiel shoulders while the rest of the girls resumed her chanting of:

_Meg, Meg!_

_Hear the bells!_

_Meg, Meg!_

_Give ‘em hell!_

“Yeah, woah!” the Winchesters screamed. “That was awesome! You owned it!”

Meg caught a sight of them, and waved at them, a radiant smile in her face.

Sam was almost willing to let her have her moment, but still, when she and Castiel finally met with them at the parking lot after declining going to a celebratory party, he had to point it out:

“I don’t know how you got the commentator to start spilling his guts like that, but you shouldn’t try that again in the future.”

“That wasn’t me,” Meg said, frowning as Dean started the car.

Castiel made a point to stare outside the window and avoid Sam’s glance.

“Well, you did good out there,” Dean said, dropping the issue. “You sure you don’t want to go celebrate with your teammates?”

“Nah,” Meg shrugged. “I’m tired. And besides, they won’t be my teammates much longer.”

“You’re leaving the team?” Sam asked.

“Yeah,” Meg explained. “I mean, I already proved my point.”

“What about you, Cas?” Dean asked. “You quitting cheerleading?”

“I don’t think so. I rather enjoy both the athletic and creative aspects of it,” Castiel said. “And the acceptance my teammates had shown has been invaluable.”

“Not to mention you look cute in that uniform,” Meg added, with a wink. Castiel blushed, but he looked immensely satisfied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was originally a one-shot birthday present for the always amazing [Qzil.](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Qzil/pseuds/Qzil/works)


	19. Serenity

In the future, Dean would look back on the little monster’s sophomore year and forever remember it as one of the calmest they ever had. Yes, , it was a little weird that suddenly Peggy was on the bunker the entire time, but he guess it really could have been a lot worse.

“What’s this letter called?”

“It’s pronounced _keph_ …”

“What are you two doing?” Dean asked, when he found Castiel and Peggy sitting on the library in front of an open book.

“Castiel is teaching me some Enochian exorcism, Mr. Page… I mean, Mr. Winchester,” Peggy replied.

“I thought it could be useful,” Castiel shrugged to Dean’s unpronounced question.

“Okay,” Dean sighed. “And where is Meg?”

“Hiding.”

“She’s scared we’re going to accidentally exorcise her,” Peggy added. She looked really mortified that her friend would think that.

Dean was tempted to ask if Peggy’s mom knew she was learning angelic magic and probably dabbling with forbidden ancient knowledge while at it, but he knew the answer to that question was probably not.

“Did you know Peggy is taking Enochian lessons?” Dean asked Sam when he found him in the kitchen, making a sandwich for the kids. He was doing it all wrong, putting way too many vegetables in it and not enough cheese, so Dean promptly took the plate off his hands and started making them himself.

“Yeah,” Sam said, looking at his brother with frustration. “I actually suggested it.”

“Why the hell did you do that?”

“Well, you know, if she’s going to be around, she might as well learn a few tricks on how to protect herself,” Sam commented. “Especially considering that Mrs. Periwinkle is running for head of the Grand Coven, which means there’ll be a lot of witches and probably demons running lose around these parts…”

“Oh, great,” Dean sighed. “Don’t you hate it when politics ruin everything?”

Sam laughed a little at the joke and took the lemonade from the fridge.

“But still, don’t you think she’s a little… young?”

“It’s not like she will go full on hunter,” Sam said. “Just… aware. In the know.”

Dean squinted at him.

“You want to turn her into a mini MOL or something?” he asked. If Charlie had been there, she’d probably smack him, so he corrected himself: “Or an WOL, more like it.”

“No,” Sam replied, in a tone that didn’t convince his brother at all. “But if that is what Peggy chooses in the future, well… I don’t think we should deny her our help.”

Dean, once again, refused to think about the future and took the sandwiches to Peggy and Castiel. They convinced Meg to come out of hiding with the promise they wouldn’t speak a word of Enochian while she was around.

“So how’s that going?” she asked, as they ate and drank the lemonade.

“Great, I think I’m starting to get the hang of it,” Peggy said, full of pride.

“Yes, and when you’ve learned the basics, I’m going to teach you some goat jokes,” Castiel said. When both girls looked at him weird, he shrugged. “They’re always popular when you’re trying to break the ice with an angel.”

So that was happening.

Besides becoming an impromptu language teacher, Castiel was also taking his cheerleading duties very seriously. He trained every afternoon, and his long, thin arms actually started to gain some muscle from holding all those girls in the air. His figure filled up and as he grew a couple more inches, he stopped looking so much like an overgrown spaghetti and more like an actual human being in his way to becoming a normally proportionated adult.

On top of that, he was well groomed and his acne disappeared overnight, and when Dean asked him about it, he happily said he was using a cream Grace, one of the girls from the squad, had recommended him.

“Her mother is a beautician, so she is sort of an expert in these things,” he said. “She’s taught all the girls how to do their hair and make-up according to their complexity and personality.”

“That’s… okay,” Dean said, not entirely sure how to answer to that at seven in the freaking morning when he still hadn’t had as much as a sip of coffee making sure his two monsters had proper breakfast before going to school.

“That’s… really nice of her,” Sam, who was a little more awake, commented.

“He’s wearing make-up too,” Meg pointed out.

Both Winchesters did a double take, because they had absolutely not noticed that at all. For a moment or two, they had no idea if it was true or if it Meg was just messing with their heads, because Castiel looked pretty much the same as always. Except because his lips were a little more voluptuous. And his eyes were a little rounder. And… what exactly had he done with his hair? Was that hair gel?

“Cas…” Dean muttered, ready to start explaining why it was weird for a boy to do that, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it seeing how happy Castiel looked. And besides, Castiel took the words right out of his mouth:

“I know you don’t consider this very, as you would say, _‘masculine’_ ,” he said, drawing air quotes with his fingers.

“Did you have your nails manicured, too?” Sam noticed.

“But it makes me feel more comfortable with my appearance in general,” Castiel continued, totally ignoring the question. “And whoever disagrees with my choice can, as Meg would put it, go to hell and complain to her.”

Dean blinked a couple of times, at the same time Meg leaned her chin on her hand and gave Castiel a dreamy look.

“Alright,” Dean sighed, still with not caffeine in his system to deal with all this. “Whatever makes you happy, I guess.”

“Thank you for your comprehension, Dean,” Castiel replied. He picked up his backpack and happily strode out of the kitchen.

“I’m going to look so good sitting on the throne with _that_ by my side,” Meg commented, getting all teary-eyed just thinking about.

Because Mrs. Periwinkle wasn’t the only one with political aspirations: Meg was taking her Political Sciences studies very seriously, and actually obtained high qualifications on that class while barely managing to not fail all the others, not because she didn’t know what they were teaching, just because she didn’t care to try and make an effort in them.

“I am the future Undisputed Ruler of Hell,” she said, when Dean pointed out by how close a margin she had passed Maths. “I will have absolutely no use for trigonometry when I take my rightful place.”

“Yeah, sure,” Dean sighed, defeated. “Except maybe to torture those poor unfortunate souls.”

Meg tilted her head.

“Huh… there’s an idea,” she said, with a serious nod. Sam was pretty sure that whatever reforms she was planning to make in Hell, it would probably end up looking a lot like Carlton Carey’s High School.

But it couldn’t be denied she was dedicated. She spent most of the following winter sitting on the couch while scratching _Mephistopheles_ ears, wearing her stripped socks and reading her beat up copy of Machiavelli’s _The Prince_ for maybe the third or fourth time. Sam thought she was a funny sight, but he was not out of his mind enough to mention it.

“Hey, Sam,” she said one afternoon in January when they were all snowed in due to a sleet making the roads slippery. “How are you today?”

Sam lifted his eyes from the books to side-eye her. She was using that caramel tone she only reserved when she wanted to ask for something she knew would take a little convincing. The incredible part was that she was asking for it at all, because if she wanted something, she would usually go behind the Winchester’s back to try and get it first, and only ask for their help if she failed.

“I’m fine,” Sam said, cautiously. “Yourself?”

“Good, good,” she said, nodding. “You know… enjoying this beautiful afternoon in which there’s absolutely nothing to do around here, and I was thinking…”

“I’m not going out to get you a movie, Meg,” Sam cut her off. “I don’t care how gory and terrible it is and how much you _have_ to see it. The roads are impassable, and I don’t feel like breaking my neck today.”

“I was actually going to ask you if you wanted to do something with me,” Meg said, twisting her mouth in an angry gesture. “And we wouldn’t even have to leave the bunker for it, but you ruined it.”

She pouted, crossing her arms over her chest and looked away from Sam. He was mildly aware that she was probably manipulating him into something he’ll grow to regret, but he still had to ask:

“What is that you wanted to do?”

“A summoning,” Meg replied, with a sudden smile lighting up her features.

“No,” Sam said, so glad that they had put all those wards in the rare ingredients cabinet.

“Oh, come on,” Meg begged. “Just a minor demon. You won’t even have to let it out of the trap!”

“No!” Sam repeated. “And why do you want to invoke a demon anyway? I thought you liked being the only black-eyed abomination around these parts.”

“You don’t have to be mean,” she rolled her eyes. “I just… want a status update, okay?”

“On what?”

“Hell’s politics,” Meg explained. “I want to know who is ruling things these days now that Abaddon’s dead and Crowley’s been turned into the ugliest preschooler ever.”

“Does it really matter? You’re going to organize a coup d’etat against whoever it is anyway.”

“Different enemies need different strategies to be defeated,” Meg replied. “I have to start preparing myself.”

Sam looked at her again. She had grown a lot in the last couple of years: her hair was longer because she refused to let anyone near it with a pair of scissors. She was taller, though Castiel was always about a head taller than her, so she had systematically started to get boots and shoes with higher and higher heels, so carefully and methodically that Dean hadn’t even noticed. She’d even found a leather jacket she now refused to take off. She was looking a lot more like the demon he’d met back in the day too.

And she was also smarter. The old version of Meg would have probably charged inside Hell’s throne room without enough supporters or power to face whoever was king and got herself killed. She had in fact done so, ages ago. Sam still remembered killing a demon because he had been absolutely certain that he would betray them (and her, specifically) when they walked in on Crowley’s prison.

But now she was more patient and more prepared, but still not enough that she wouldn’t be in danger when she went to war. Because Sam had no illusions about it, she would go to war for what she thought was rightfully hers, and the mere idea terrified her.

“Meg,” he said, finally closing his books to give her all the attention. “I don’t think you should be worrying about it right now.”

“Why not? I’ve been waiting a long time to finally have my powers in full swing back,” she said, extending her hands and making the lights flicker as if to illustrate her point. “And now that I finally do, I don’t want to extend this any longer than I have to.”

“Rowena said you still had some years of growing up to do,” Sam pointed out. “Maybe you should wait until then. You might still become more powerful. And honestly, making decisions like these when you’re still a teenager is not always the best idea.”

“I’m not a teenager,” Meg reminded him.

“You act like one, though, because that’s the way your mind is wired right now,” Sam argued. “And besides, I know you have to act all aloof and indifferent, but you can’t sincerely tell me that you haven’t enjoyed this. Living here with us and Cas, hanging out with Peggy. Has it really been so bad that you want it to end so soon?”

Meg crossed her arms, and for a moment, Sam was sure she was going to refuse to answer. In the end, however, she muttered the tiniest, lowest:

“No.”

“Then wait a couple of years more, at least,” he said. “Until you’re sure taking over Hell is what you want to do with your life and you’re sure you won’t be at any unnecessary risks when trying to get it.”

Meg tilted her head, a gesture she had picked up from Castiel.

“Did you just… give me the finish high school first speech?”

“Huh,” Sam muttered. “I guess I did.”

They looked at each other, and then burst out laughing. Dean and Castiel found them an hour later, throwing popcorn at the TV every time one of the characters in the horror movie they were watching died. Without anything else to do, they joined them: Castiel sat on the carpet with Meg and put an arm around her shoulders, while Dean flailed down next to Sam and stole the popcorn bowl from him.

It was the best Friday night they had in a while.

Winter ended, and soon it was time to choose a destination for their summer road trip, because nobody wanted to be ambushed by Rowena all over again.

“How about Disney World?” Sam suggested over dinner.

“That place is evil,” Meg declared, and that was saying something coming from her. “Let’s go to Vegas!”

“You do realize you don’t look old enough to get in the casinos, right?” Dean said.

“So? Aren’t you like experts at making fake ID’s?”

“We’re not going to Vegas,” Sam said, shuddering at the idea of letting a literal demon loose in the City of Sin. “Cas, any suggestions?”

Cas put down his fork pensively.

“How about the Grand Canyon?” he said. “Lita’s parents took her there last summer, and she assured me it’s quite lovely.”

Everybody went quiet for a moment or two.

“You know, buddy, I think you’re onto something,” Dean said.

They unfolded a route map over the table after desserts, and Dean calculated how many miles separated them from Arizona.

“So if we stopped here and here, we should make it in about…”

“Sixteen hours,” Sam interrupted him. When Dean stared at him in disbelief, Sam turned around his computer. “Technology is a wonderful thing, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, well,” Dean pouted. “You shouldn’t always trust those wretched things. So if you and I take turns to drive every six hours…”

“We could also help with the driving,” Castiel suggested. “We look old enough to get a permit now.”

“You’re full brilliant ideas today, Clarence,” Meg smiled at him.

Dean clearly didn’t agree.

“Absolutely not,” he said. “I’m not letting you get a driver’s license, let alone drive my baby on a national route.”

“It’s actually not a bad….” Sam commented. Dean glared at him.

“Which side are you on?!”

“This isn’t about taking sides, Dean,” Sam said. “I just think it will give them more mobility, and certainly, it’ll make the trip shorter if it’s four people driving instead of two.”

“If it makes you feel more comfortable, Dean, you could always teach us,” Castiel suggested. “That way you will make sure we know how to treat your car correctly.”

Dean decided to do what he always did when he realized he was about to lose a discussion: walk away while he still could have the last word.

“There’s no way, no how, I’m teaching you to how to drive,” he said, standing up and waving a finger in front of them to emphasize his point. “And that’s final.”


	20. Drive

“Okay, so you need to step on the pedal… gently, gently!”

“Dean, for the love of Lucifer, I have been driving cars since they were invented!”

It took a couple of weeks of begging, some scorn from Sam, a downright threat to take the car when he wasn’t looking and a visit from Charlie and her puppy eyes, but they finally worn out Dean’s resolution. Meg and Castiel insisted they already knew the basics and could easily pass a driver’s test if needed, but Sam insisted they got Dean on board with it, because he would just no accept it until he’d seen it with his own eyes.

So there they were, in bunker’s garage with all those vintage cars that probably didn’t even work anymore, with Dean showing Meg how exactly to drive his baby.

“Should we help? He kind of looks like he’s about to lose his mind in there,” Charlie commented. She, Sam and Castiel were standing aside, eating sandwiches and watching Dean and Meg argue and make obscene gestures at one another inside the car.

“Well, you know, it’s one of the few mementos we have of our father, and there were times we practically lived in that car,” Sam commented. “So it’s obvious he’d be a little hysterical at the idea that Meg could crash it.”

“Meg is a far better driver than he’s giving her credit for,” Castiel commented. “And besides, saying Dean is a little hysterical is an exaggerated understatement.”

Sam couldn’t really argue against that.

“Stop, stop!” Dean shouted. “You’re going to drown her engine, don’t do that!”

Meg got out of the car, making a point to slam the door as violently as she could and walked away with her hands in the air.

“You deal with him, I’m fucking done!” she told Castiel, at the same time she snatched his sandwich from his hands and leaned on the car, clearly using all her force of will to not murder anybody.

“Hey, be more careful!” Dean shouted from the car. “These doors are delicate, if you can’t treat them with respect…”

Meg raised a middle finger in his direction.

“Meg, I swear to God…”

“Don’t drag that old asshole into this! He can’t help you now!”

“Alright, I’ll try,” Castiel stepped forward, trying to de-escalate the situation avoid further blasphemies.

“Yeah, and you’re going to be better in any way and form!” Dean assured, shooting a last glare towards Meg before retaking his place in the passenger seat.

“So, this trip to the Grand Canyon,” Charlie said, completely oblivious to all the shouting and fighting around her. “Is it Winchesters only, or can I come?”

“Of course you can come,” Sam said. “The more, the merrier.”

“You know what would even make it merrier?” Meg said. “If we stop at a gas station somewhere and ditch Dean while he’s in the bathroom.”

“We’re not doing that,” Sam sighed, because now he would have to watch out for Meg not trying to do that.

Meg clicked her tongue with disappointment.

“Okay, Cas, turn on the engine,” Dean indicated inside the Impala.

“Right,” Castiel said, blinking at the wheel in front of him. “I know how to do that.”

He remained completely immobile for a few seconds, and then moved the key. The engine roared to like, and Castiel smirked, satisfied.

“Okay, so now step on the clutch…”

Castiel looked down at the pedals in front of him, and a little crease appeared between his eyebrow.

“Uh… which one is that?”

“You don’t know what the clutch is?” Dean asked, just to make sure, and Castiel shook his head. “You have not even the faintest idea how to drive?”

“I have wings, I never needed another method of transportation,” Castiel answered, a little offended at the question. “But I have been watching you drive for many years, Dean, I do believe I have more than just a _faintest_ idea.”

“Okay, angel, roll back the attitude,” Dean sighed. What was up with kids those days? “I’m going to explain it to you, pay attention…”

Outside the car, Meg took out her cellphone and started filming the car.

“What are you doing?” Sam asked.

“If he crashes the car, it’s going to be an excellent Vine,” Meg replied calmly.

“If he crashes the car, there’s no way we’re going to the Grand Canyon,” Sam pointed out.

“Yeah, I don’t think we can all fit in my Beetle,” Charlie said. “For one, Sam would have to crouch all the time.”

“You got it, Cas?”

“I think so,” Castiel said, still looking at the pedals like he wasn’t exactly sure what he was supposed to be doing with them. “Okay… here goes nothing.”

He (“Gently, GENTLY!”) stepped on the accelerator and the car moved forwards a little bit.

“Good, buddy, you’re doing great,” Dean nodded. “Let’s see if you can roll her all the way outside,” he rolled down the window and shouted at Sam: “Hey, open the door!”

“He’s actually letting him take the car outside?” Charlie asked, raising her eyebrows in complete shock.

“Of course he is,” Meg rolled her eyes. “Cas is his favorite.”

Sam obeyed his brother just in time to get out of the way before the Impala dashed past him and into the empty road outside the bunker.

“Are they going to be okay?” Charlie asked. She looked a little concerned.

“Probably,” Meg shrugged. “As long as Cas doesn’t crash the car or scratches it against something.”

Sam shuddered at the thought.

 

* * *

 

“You’re doing great, Cas,” Dean congratulated him. “Keep your eyes on the road…”

“Why? You never do that,” Castiel pointed out.

“True, and that’s how once we ended up crashed by a truck,” Dean replied. He omitted the part where the crash had been caused by a possessed truck driver. “You don’t want that to happen, do you?”

Castiel slowed down to the point of almost stopping, with both hands gripping the wheel very tight.

“Okay, you don’t have to… you can go faster,” Dean encouraged him. “It’s fine.”

“Are you sure? Because trucks…”

“It’s fine, Cas,” Dean assured him. “Just check the rearview now and then and you should be okay.”

Dean would have liked to turn on some music or maybe even make a little conversation, but Castiel looked a bit terrified, with both eyes stuck on the road. He imagined that if the angel was disturbed by even the slightest sound, he would end up swerving off the road. So instead, Dean rolled the window down and let the wind crash against his face for a moment. Castiel was doing amazing and heeding every one of his instructions. Why couldn’t Meg just do the same?

“Turn on the left signal,” Dean ordered him. “And let’s go this way.”

“Why?”

“Why not?” Dean replied with a shrug.

Castiel had nothing to respond to that, so he did it. In just a few seconds, they were on the open freeway, with absolutely nothing but the asphalt in front of them. Dean kept instructing Castiel on how to control the car (“Move the wheel a little to the left, you want to stay right in the middle… no, it’s okay, you can go faster, really, just try it… there we go, now don’t forget to check the rearview…”) until he started noticing the angel’s shoulders weren’t as tense and his grip on the wheel wasn’t as tight. Only then Dean leaned over and turned on the radio.

“Is that absolutely necessary?” Castiel asked.

“Of course it is,” Dean replied. “It’s part of the experience: the road, some good old classic rock… come on, Cas, don’t tell me you don’t love Led Zeppelin.”

“Well, as I have now spent years travelling in the backseat of this very same car with you blasting that very same music, I’d be lying if I said that I haven’t developed a certain appreciation for the genre,” Castiel replied, in his most polite tone of voice. Dean felt insulted nonetheless.

“ _Appreciation?_ ”

“However, my friends from the cheerleading squad had introduced me to this young country singer,” Castiel continued, ignoring Dean’s tone. “And I must say I quite enjoy the music she makes.”

“Okay, but you can’t tell me she’s better than Led,” Dean protested. “Who is she, anyway?”

“Taylor Swift.”

Dean’s first reaction was to jump out of the window, because John Winchester’s voice had just boomed inside his head from beyond the grave with a startling: “NO SON OF MINE…!”

But then again, Castiel wasn’t actually _his_ son, and besides, he had accepted all the other crap: the knitting, the make-up, the cheerleading squad, the fact he could braid both Peggy and Meg’s hair better than the girls themselves could… this wasn’t all that different, just another of those quirky aspects of Castiel growing up to be…

“No, I’m sorry,” Dean said, shaking his head. “I can’t. It’s too much, Castiel.”

“I’m sure if you gave her a chance you would come to appreciate her unique style as well,” Castiel said. “I will ask Suzie for a CD mix with her songs, and we can hear it when we’re on our way to the Grand Canyon.”

“No.”

“Why not? We can’t listen to Led Zeppelin all the way there,” Castiel argued.

“Yes, we can,” Dean said. And then a wonderful thought occurred to him. “Besides, Baby only has a cassette player, so there. Your CD mix won’t work here.”

Castiel stopped looking at the road for exactly two seconds to analyze the cassette player, as if it was the first time he noticed it.

“Huh,” he muttered to himself.

“What?” Dean narrowed his eyes at him, sensing he was about to get a good dose of sass from the angel.

Castiel didn’t disappoint:

“I was just thinking Meg is right,” he commented, casually. “You do hold on to the past like a dinosaur refusing to see that the blinking light in the sky is getting closer.”

Dean’s jaw hanged open, not because he didn’t believe Meg would say something like that, but because Castiel actually had the audacity to repeat it. He was supposed to be the kind one.

“Okay, you know what?” Dean groaned, angrily. “Fine. I’ll get one of those fancy new CD players or whatever, and you can get your friends to do your remix CD.”

“Really?” Castiel was so surprised this time he forgot to look at the road for half a minute.

“Yes,” Dean groaned. “But only during the times you’ll be driving. Driver picks the music…”

“… shotgun shuts his cakehole,” Castiel finished the phrase in unison to him. But he was smiling. “That’s really nice of you, Dean.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dean muttered, already making up a driving schedule that would mean that neither Meg nor Castiel would be behind the wheel for more than twenty minutes at a time.

After another while driving through nothing but empty fields, Dean instructed Castiel to pull over.

“Why?”

“Just pull over, Cas.”

Castiel threw him a reluctant glance, but he obeyed: he carefully place his foot on the brakes until the Impala stopped at the side of the road.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing, Cas, I just thought you needed a break,” Dean said. “To get, stretch your arms, stretch your legs…”

“Dean, I am an extremely resilient supernatural being…”

“Get out of the car.”

Castiel stopped protesting and did as Dean ordered, but afterwards he stood near the booth, like he wasn’t certain what to do, exactly. Dean opened the car’s booth. There were days in which the Impala was full of hidden weaponry, knives and guns to go around, plus some gasoline, some blood, whatever the boys would need to do their enemies in. Those days, it contained a myriad of things that sure as hell weren’t exactly mortal: extra notebooks in case the little ones forgot theirs on the way home, a first aid kit, Castiel’s knitting needles and some of his balls of wool. Dean found the cooler underneath some coats and sweaters they kept in there in case there was a sudden drop of temperature and took it out.

“There you go,” he said, handing Castiel a bottle of beer.

Castiel stared at it like it was radioactive and then back at Dean like he was asking him to kill himself by drinking it.

“What’s the matter?”

“I’m not supposed to drink and drive, that’s really irresponsible behavior,” Castiel explained. “And besides, I am technically only sixteen…”

“You’re older than earth itself, Castiel,” Dean replied, rolling his eyes. “And besides, aren’t you a super resilient supernatural being? What happened to that? I highly doubt one beer’s gonna get you hammered.”

Castiel still hesitated, so Dean simply put the beer over the booth where he could grab it if he wanted to.

“Fine,” he sighed, as he uncapped his own beer with the side of his keys. “At least I know you’ll be resisting peer pressure and all that.”

“My peers have never pressure me into drinking alcohol,” Castiel said, tilting his head. “Though Ashlee has some really self-destructive ideas about shaving she’s been trying to impose to the whole squad.”

Dean decided he didn’t want to know any details for that.

“How’s that working out for you?” he asked instead.

“I’m not really sure I want to try any of the methods she suggested, especially for the more sensitive areas…”

“No, I mean,” Dean shook his head, and did his best to refuse to acknowledge what Castiel was implying. “Do you like the squad and all? Because I remember that not that long ago, you were brooding about not having any friends.”

“I do not brood,” Castiel protested, narrowing his eyes at Dean.

“ _Sure_ you don’t,” Dean replied. “Question still stands.”

Castiel leaned on the booth next to Dean, and grabbed the beer. He didn’t open it, but he made it roll in his hands as if he was lost in thought.

“They are extremely accepting,” he said, in the end. “First, they all assumed I had homosexual inclinations. I am not entirely sure what gave them that impression.”

“Beats me,” Dean said, taking a swig of his beer.

“They also didn’t understand that despite my vessel being male, I am essentially genderless, and therefore my sexual identity is a little more complex than that. But soon they discovered Meg and I have a very close relationship,” the angel continued. “Which, given our cover, should have been slightly… unusual for them, but once again, they were completely accepting. They have given a lot of valuable advice.”

“That’s nice to hear,” Dean nodded.

Castiel finally opened the cap, and hesitantly took a sip. He choked and ended up coughing so much Dean had to pat him in the back.

“What’s the matter?”

“My… taste buds, they’re not used to…”

“You’ve drunk beer before!”

“Not in this… not in this…” Castiel took a deep, long gasp. “Not in this incarnation of my vessel.”

He cleared his throat and hit his chest with a closed fist until he seemed to recover. Dean did his best to not laugh in his face.

The sun was falling and everything around them had adopted a melancholic tone of orange. The spring night promised to be slightly chilly, and Dean supposed they should head back home soon. But it had been such a peaceful afternoon he didn’t want to end just yet. Suddenly, he was beginning to realize they were at the end of a lot of things: next year would be the kids’ junior year, and then they wouldn’t be exactly kids anymore. They would be going ahead with whatever it was that they planned to do, and he was going to turn forty-one. God, he never imagined he’d lived that long. And he probably wouldn’t have if they hadn’t taken that long hiatus from hunting to care for those troublemakers.

He was going to miss them when they left. Yes, even Meg with her evil schemes.

“Dean?” Castiel called, interrupting Dean’s thoughts.

“Yeah, buddy?”

“It’s just dawned on me that Meg and I never thanked you and Sam for what you did for us,” Castiel said. He looked up at Dean. His blue eyes didn’t look as enormously big as they used to when he was littler, and his voice had become rougher, sounding a lot more like it had when Dean had first met him. “Taking us in, giving up hunting for us…”

“Cas, come on,” Dean shook his head. “It was nothing. We did what we had to. I’m sure you and Meg would have done the same thing for us if the situations had been reversed.”

Cas opened his mouth like he wanted to say something else, but slowly, a grin appeared on his lips and soon he was letting out a series of quiet chuckles.

“What?” Dean asked, frowning at him.

“Oh, I’m just imagining what it would be like dealing with children that can put you in a Devil Trap if they don’t like your rules,” Castiel explained. “Meg would not have been too happy about that.”

Dean got a very specific mental image of a grown Meg shrieking in fury, and he started cracking up too. In about two seconds, the two were roaring with laughter, loud and happy like they hadn’t laughed in a while.

“Come on, now,” Dean said, after he’d calmed down and wiped the tears from his eyes. “Let’s go back before it gets dark.”

Charlie, Sam and Meg were playing cards when they came back, and judging by their expression, the demon was winning.

“She’s cheating!” Charlie accused her. “I don’t know how, but she is!”

“What are you betting?”

“The turns to drive on the trip to the Grand Canyon,” Sam said, rubbing his temples like he was about to give up on life entirely.

“Oh, yes,” Meg rubbed her hands after revealing another winning hand. “Guess who’s having control of the car and the stereo for seven hours straight.”

Dean decided that was against everything he stood for and decided to join the game, convincing Castiel to do the same in the name of Taylor Swift. The game extended well into the night, and Dean recovered the right to drive the Impala for most of the trip. Meg accused him of being a bigger cheat than her, but she couldn’t prove anything.


	21. Test

The silence in the classroom was unnerving. Meg kept toying with her pencil, looking at the questions in front of her, huffing in discontent and trying to catch a glimpse of the answers in Castiel’s paper.

She had suggested they just faked the driver’s licenses, but that was the disadvantaged of suggesting something morally dubious in front of angel and two hunters: they insisted on doing everything by the damn book. Meg was half convinced this was a ploy to keep her away from the wheel, and if she had been able to read their minds, she would have found out that, at least in Dean’s case, she was totally right.

Still, it was cruel and unusual that she had to get up so early _on a Saturday_ to sit down in a room that had no air conditioning, with at least thirty other people from a wide range of ages, some of them sweating profusely from both the heat and the nerves. How the hell was she supposed to concentrate on the task like that when the guy next to her kept scratching his hair with the tip of the pencil?

Besides, the test was ridiculous. What would she do if it was raining and there was a moose standing in the middle of the road? She would yell at Sam to stop being dramatic and get back in the car. Seriously, who came up with those questions?

She knew torture when she saw it, and this was definitely it.

“Cas,” she whispered, so low that the humans couldn’t hear her.

Castiel gave her a sideway glance, and then continued to scribbled and filled little circles in front of him. It was almost cute, the way he frowned all concentrated, but Meg was really not in the mood to appreciate it.

“Cas!” she called again, a little louder this time.

The driving instructor sitting in front of the classroom raised his eyes from the book he was reading, probably wondering if he really heard something, but promptly looked back down again.

“Cas…”

“We’re not supposed to talk,” Castiel muttered between his teeth.

“What did you put in number forty six?”

“I’m not telling you, Meg,” he replied, a little annoyed. “You should know these things.”

“I know them, but I want to know what you put in number forty six,” Meg insisted.

This time, the instructor put the book down with a thump, startling all of the test-takers. He stared at them intensely over his glasses, trying to figure out who were the ones who were whispering, but since the class was in absolute silence, he finally returned his attention to his book.

Castiel glared at Meg as if to say “See what you did?” and went back to his test, but Meg wouldn’t be so easily defeated. She tore out a bit of one of the blank pages they were allowed to have in case their answers got longer, scribbled his question and threw the ball of paper at Castiel’s desk. It landed right in the middle of his test.

Castiel looked up at the ceiling like he was begging for patience and then opened the small ball of paper. Meg was pleased to see the pink coloration rising to his cheeks and how he shifted on his seat to give her an interrogative look. Meg threw a kiss in the air, and then of course Castiel had no option but to yield. With an exasperated sigh, he wrote the answer and passed the ball back to Meg.

This time the instructor saw them. Maybe because he had finally lost interest in his book, or maybe he was finally paying attention to the potential new drivers, but he definitely caught a glimpse of what was going on and stood up to put a stop to it immediately. He stomped towards the last row, and glared down at Meg, who happily glanced back at him, blinking like she hadn’t done a bad thing in her entire life.

“You’re cheating,” the instructor groaned. He clearly was a man of few words.

“Of course not,” Meg said, tilting her head. “I wouldn’t dare.”

“Show me the paper,” the instructor demanded, extending his hands towards her.

“What paper?”

“The one you have in your hands.”

“I don’t have anything in my hands.”

By that point, every person in the room was staring at them with a mix of curiosity and the hopes that something interesting would actually happen that morning. Cas hit his forehead with an open palm.

“Cheating isn’t allowed,” the instructor continued in his monotonous tone, but it was clear he was at the edge of losing his patience. “Hand me the paper. Now.”

Castiel was sure Meg was going to keep refusing, but to his surprise, she actually opened her hands to let the ball fall over her test.

“Oh, you mean this paper?” she asked, still in her most innocent tone, the one she used to deny it had been her that had caused a mild military crisis at school. “Yeah, this isn’t cheating.”

“Give me that!” the instructor ordered, finally raising his voice.

Meg obediently put it in his hands. The instructor unfolded it, and for a terrible second, Castiel thought he was going to read what it said out loud. But he simply read it a couple of times, eyed Meg suspiciously, like he thought he was fooling him somehow, and finally gave it back to her.

“Finish your test,” he ordered her. “And no talking!” he warned the other students, who quickly turned their attentions back to the papers.

Meg grinned in Castiel’s direction, and he sighed. Of course she would write a declaration of love just to distract herself in the middle of a boring test and annoy the instructor.

“Come on, it was funny!” she said, five minutes later while they walked out of the classroom. “Did you see his face when he thought we were cheating? I thought he was going to explode!”

“Yes, Meg, it was hilarious,” Castiel mumbled, although he clearly didn’t think so. “I will beg of you not to try anything like that with the next part of the test, though. It would be counterproductive for you to annoy the instructor when you’re in the road.”

“How hard could it possibly be?” Meg said, rolling her eyes so hard Castiel was pretty certain she was seeing the back of her head.

When they arrived to the parking lot where the instructors were waiting, the question answered itself: the two instructors meant for them were as different as they could be. The first one was a woman in her late twenties, who was leaning against the car’s boot with all the calm in the world, sporting Oxford jeans and a jacket full of peace symbols and four leaved clovers. She had long hair and a languid smile in her face while she invited the kids to come closer.

The other instructor was a man in his fifties, with a big wooden cross hanging around his neck on top of his prominent belly. He was standing as far as he could from the hippie girl, and scowling disapprovingly at Meg and Castiel, even though they had done basically nothing but walking towards them.

“Good morning, children,” the hippy woman said, showing them a beatific smile. “Now, which one of you is Castiel?”

“That’d be me,” Castiel said, taking a step forwards.

“Very well, then,” she said, opening the door of one of the cars. “Let’s go, I’m sure we’re going to have a really good time.”

Meg glanced in the man’s direction, who groaned at her and dragged his feet towards the car.

“Oh, hell, no,” she muttered. “Cas, let’s trade.”

“Sorry, we can’t do that,” Castiel replied, with a little shrug. “I’m sure you’ll do just fine.”

“This is because of the paper ball, isn’t it?” Meg asked, but Castiel was already sliding inside the driver’s seat.

Promising it was the last time she included the angel in anything, Meg got inside the other car. The instructor pulled out a clipboard and a pen and stared at Meg with his nostrils flaring.

“So… I guess we should start by putting on the seatbelt, right?” Meg asked. The instructor made no sound, almost as if he hadn’t heard her at all, so Meg went ahead and put it on anyway. “And now I guess we start the car,” she continued. The instructor didn’t even bother to nod. Meg started the car. “You’re not a great conversation maker, huh? What would Jesus think?”

The instructor didn’t seem to find her joke funny, so Meg just grimaced and drove the car out of the parking lot.

 

* * *

 

“Take your time, child, I can see you’re nervous,” Daisy (as Castiel’s instructor introduced herself) said. “Just relax and keep your eyes on the road at all times. It should be fine. Do you mind if I put on some music?”

“No, of course not,” Castiel said. Daisy grinned at him and put a CD on. The sound of bells and a banjo invaded the car, and Daisy moved her head up and down to its rhythm, humming lowly to herself.

“There we go,” she said, rolling down the window. “Oh, you missed a stop sign.”

“Oh,” Castiel gripped the wheel a little tighter. “I… I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, child, we all make mistakes,” Daisy replied, staring into the distance while still humming. “I’m sure you will manage to slow down for that school we’re approaching now. Isn’t it pretty, schools? Children opening their minds to new knowledge and making new friends with other kids their age…”

“That’s what I keep telling Meg!” Castiel said, enthusiastic. “She’s always so cynical about everything.”

“People who are cynical miss so many little joys in life,” Daisy sighed, like just thinking about cynical people left her completely exhausted. “Oh, be careful now, we have a red light ahead.”

Castiel had been so distracted looking at Daisy that he almost didn’t notice, but he still manage to stop… right above the crosswalk.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay, child,” Daisy said, nodding. “You’re still learning, and should be allowed to make as many mistakes as you need to. What’s important is that you learn from them.”

“You are such a nice person!” Castiel commented, touched.

“Kindness is a virtue that needs to be cultivated every day,” Daisy commented. “By the way, the light’s green. You’re holding the traffic.”

Somebody honked behind them impatiently, and when Castiel looked in the rearview mirror, he saw Meg, looking like she had just swallowed an entire lemon, and her deadpan instructor staring at him with an expressionless face.

“Tell me about it,” Castiel sighed as he accelerated again.

 

* * *

 

“So what’s your name?” Meg asked. The instructor continued to be completely silent. “Not a big fan of sharing, huh? That’s okay, I’m not either. I like to keep a cool and mysterious aura.”

The instructor remained silent, but he checked something on his clipboard. Meg sighed. She was convinced she was about to fail this test, so she might as well try to have fun with it.

“I mean, it’s quite easy for a demon like me,” she said. “That’s not figurative. I’m an actual demon. I’ve been to Hell. Satan and I used to be tight.”

The instructor gave no signal of having heard her at all.

“Yep, but some assholes stopped the apocalypse and one thing led to another… I got almost a normal life now,” she added, rolling her eyes and turning her signal before turning around on a corner. “I lived with those assholes, but they’re mostly okay. Dean still doesn’t let me stay up late and eat all the chocolate in the house, though. I disobey him, of course, because I’m a demon. I think I should hammer that point home.”

The instructor tapped his clipboard with the pen, and Meg interpreted that as an invitation to continue.

“Oh, sure, I do evil deeds these days,” she said, rolling her eyes and stopping at a corner so a blind lady could cross. “All sorts of evil deeds. Absolutely. They’re just not as spectacular as they used to be. It’s fine, though. My boyfriend warns me when I’m about to cross some sort of line. My boyfriend’s an angel, by the way. That’s also not figurative. Bet you didn’t see that coming, huh?”

The instructor didn’t say a word, but he blinked, so Meg assumed he was hearing her still.

“Well, I didn’t see it coming either,” she said, stopping right behind Castiel’s car at a red light. “But here we are. Doesn’t your guy work in mysterious ways and all that jazz? Well, He completely batted it out of the field with us two.”

She honked so Castiel would move when the lights changed.

“That’s not entirely a bad thing,” she said, while they turned around to go back to the parking lot. “I’m not the demon I used to be, but if I have to be honest with you, I know a lot of demons who have it a lot worse than me.”

She parked the car between the lines in two movements.

“All things considered, I guess I can’t complain,” she continued, turning off the engine and unbuckling her seat belt. “I get to meet a lot of people who are not what they appear to be. Like you, for example. If you were another kind of person, you would be trying to exorcise me right now. It’s not pretty, being exorcise, so it’s cool that you’re not trying to do that with me right now. You’re kinda cool. If, you know, terse.”

The instructor didn’t say a word. He wrote down another thing in his clipboard and got out of the car. Meg assumed that meant that the test was over, and with all the things she had told that guy, she was half-expecting him to declare her criminally insane and deny her the license.

Meanwhile, Castiel was struggling to park the car straight, but after some very long fifteen minutes and some hitting the wall behind, he managed to finally place it where it should be.

“Very well, Castiel,” said his hippy instructor as they got out.

“Thank you, Daisy,” Castiel said, smiling a little. Meg crooked an eyebrow, but she didn’t say a word. “So when can we expect to receive our licenses?”

“Oh, no, child, you’re not getting a license,” said Daisy, and she seemed frankly surprised that Castiel had thought he’d be getting one. “It'd karmically irresponsible, not to mention illegal since you didn't meet the standards demanded by the Department.”

“What?” Castiel asked, confused. “I didn’t pass?”

“I don’t believe in putting a number in one’s attempts,” Daisy replied, again with that dreamy look in her eyes. “Yours was a brave one, but it was… insufficient. I do hope, however, that you have learnt from your mistakes here and do better next time.”

She patted Castiel in the head a couple of times and danced away, leaving the angel completely lost and Meg snickering by his side.

“Don’t feel bad, Clarence,” she told him. “I don’t think I passed either…”

She hadn’t even finished saying it with a finger like a sausage tapped her in the shoulder. The instructor handed her a paper, before nodding curtly and also going away.

“What does it said?” Castiel asked, trying to look over her shoulder. Meg couldn’t hold back her grin.

“Would you look at that?”

 

* * *

 

“Okay, be honest with us,” Dean said later, when they were driving back home. “What did you do to that poor instructor?”

“Nothing,” Meg shrugged. “Believe it or not, I passed out of sheer ability. The photographer, however, I did mess a little with his mind so he would take another picture of me. I didn’t like the first one,” she shrugged when Sam glared severely at her.

“Don’t be sad, Cas,” Sam said, looking at the crestfallen angel looking out the window sulkily. “Daisy told us you did okay, but you just needed more practice.”

“How do you know Daisy?” Castiel asked, frowning.

Sam mumbled something about going to a bar months ago and the world being small.

“Figures you would go for the hippy chick,” Dean chuckled. “Well, it doesn’t matter. I guess I’m gonna have to let you drive the Impala, Meg.”

“Can I get my own car?” Meg asked, with a malicious glimmer in her eyes.

“Sure,” Dean said. Sam stared at him and had to physically restrain himself from putting a hand in his forehead to check if he had a fever. “If you work, save up and buy it yourself.”

Sam sighed, relieved. That sounded a lot more like it.

“You’re no fun,” Meg scoffed, but she was clearly too elated to be angry. “It doesn’t matter,” she added, smiling. “Grand Canyon, here we come.”


	22. Tourist-trapped

“We should have taken that exit hours ago!”

“I don’t get this. Aren’t you like experts on road trips?”

“Give me that map!”

Dean gripped the wheel a little tighter, trying with all his might not to shout at his family. It wasn’t his fault that they were lost. Sam had been driving when they missed their exit, and all the jokes about how he missed the sign because it was too close to the ground had stopped being funny about half an hour ago. They knew they were somewhere in Oklahoma (How? Why? It was a mystery), but little else. They had passed the last gas station miles ago, and there in the middle of that seemingly endless road, Charlie’s super advanced phone didn’t have signal, so she couldn’t turn on the GPS to guide them away from that mess. They depended on an old dog-eared map that had probably been in the car since before John owned it.

But Dean could deal with that. He could deal with having no idea where he was and how much of an effort Baby would have to make before they could fill her tank again. He could deal with the sun hitting his eyes because Castiel had accidentally sat on his sunglasses and the sweat dripping down his back because he didn’t want to exhaust Baby by turning on the air conditioning and the air coming in through the rolled down window was hot and full of sand. He could deal with the hunger, because they had eaten their last sandwiches hours ago, and with the thirst, because the juice and water they’ve brought were practically boiling now. He could deal with the brand new stereo dying, so they didn’t have any music for the moment being. He could deal with all of that, no problem.

What was really wearing his patience thin was all the damned bickering.

“I’m telling you, that it’s not the road we’re in!” Sam insisted

“Do you have a pencil? Maybe I could mark it on the map…” Charlie said, looking down at the map intensely, like that way she could force it to reveal its secrets.

“We keep going this way, we’re going to end up in Mexico,” Meg huffed. “Actually, you know, that’s not a bad idea…”

“Shut up!” Dean exclaimed, a little louder than he intended, but at least everybody went quiet for a couple of seconds so he could think. “Castiel, I need you to fly back to that station we passed by a couple of hours ago. Find out where we are, buy a map and some snacks, and fly back here again.”

To his irritation, the angel didn’t immediately disappear to do as he was told.

“Is there a problem?” Dean groaned.

“How am I supposed to find you afterwards?” Castiel said. “The car is protected, I can’t trace it.”

“Well, you can trace us, can’t you?” Sam pointed out.

“No, you’re protected too,” Castiel reminded them.

“And Meg?”

Meg took out a little hex bag out of her jacket pocket.

“I’ve angered a lot of angels back in my day. Sorry, not risking it.”

“Well, he can trace me then,” Charlie volunteered. “I don’t have any protections or spells in me.”

“That’s actually not a good thing,” Sam said. “It could be dangerous. You should fix that.”

“Yeah, but not today,” Dean agreed, stopping the car on the side of the road. “Don’t take long, Cas.”

Castiel disappeared in a flutter of wings. The rest of them stepped out of the car. Dean considered that was actually a good thing: his legs and arms had started to get tense, and it served to defuse all the arguing that had been happening five minutes ago.

“All of this wouldn’t be necessary if Sam had stopped to ask for directions,” Meg pointed out.

Or not, whatever.

“Who was I supposed to ask?” Sam groaned. “A cactus?”

“What’s the plural of cactus?” Charlie wondered out loud. “Cactuses? Cacti?”

“Who cares?” Dean sighed. “I just want to get the hell out of this desert.”

Castiel appeared right besides Charlie, startling her. He was carrying a bag of groceries and a map in his hand.

“I tried to get the man in the store to tell me which direction we should take,” he said. “But he thought I was pulling his leg since I didn’t have a car or wasn’t with any of the groups in the store. He was very rude.”

Sam hit his forehead with his palm while Meg shook his head, disappointed.

“Clarence, how many times have I told you lying is an essential skill?”

“A lady outside was nicer, though,” Castiel continued, unfolding the map. “She said the next turn left should put us on back on Route 40 and it’s all straight to Arizona from them on.”

“Thank you!” Dean said, snatching the map from his hands and opening the car’s door.

“She also said we wouldn’t be there before nightfall,” Castiel added. “So she recommended her cousin’s motel right at this side of the road. She said is right next to the biggest ball of yarn of the country, which she assured me it’s a sight worth seeing.”

“Oh, Cas,” Charlie said, pitifully, while everybody else groaned and huffed. The angel stared at his family in confusion. “She just wanted you to take people to her cousin’s motel.”

“No, why would she do that?” Castiel frowned. “She was nice.”

“Awesome,” Dean said, sarcastically. “The angel got us tourist-trapped.”

But there really wasn’t much that they could do, so they followed the lady’s indications. Dean put Led Zappelin as loud as he could to drown out any arguments, and glared at whoever tried to protest. When the sun started to fall, they could have probably kept on driving a few hours more, but they had no idea where the next roadside motel would be (if there was one at all), so they unanimously agreed to stop and leave early the following morning.

America’s biggest ball of yarn looked like… well, a ball of white yarn, except it was roughly the size of the motel built right next to it. Meg stopped for a second to take a picture of it with her cellphone before following everyone else inside. The motel’s reception was adorned with a large carpet with intricate patterns, and hangings depicting what seemed to be bloody images of Ancient Greek: there were people burning down in Troy, a Minotaur eating some victims in his labyrinth, Prometheus being stabbed by an eagle’s beak.

“Well, that’s not ominous _at all_ ,” Charlie commented, looking at the Troy tapestry. “These people look in actual pain.”

“Why, thank you dear,” said a voice from behind the counter. “I do try to make my works as realistic as possible.”

The motel’s owner and apparently only employee was a chubby lady with silver white hair. Despite it being so late, she was wearing enormous sunglasses.

“How may I help you?” she asked with a shrieking voice.

“Huh,” Castiel muttered, scowling.

“Is there a problem, Clarence?” Meg stopped taking pictures of the hangings for a second and turned to the angel.

“She looks exactly like her cousin,” Castiel explained.

“Well, yeah,” Meg rolled her eyes. “I have this crazy theory called genetics…”

“We’ll take two rooms,” Dean was already indicating. “Charlie can sleep with the little monsters.”

“Do I have to?” Charlie cringed.

“My, but what a beautiful family you are,” the owner commented, as she took Dean’s money and started counting it. Her fingers were exaggeratedly long and bony. “I always wished to have a family just like yours.”

“You can take them,” Dean offered, and Sam elbowed him in the ribs. “I mean, yeah, they’re alright.”

“Going to the Grand Canyon, huh?” she asked, and smiled at them when the brothers looked surprise. Her teeth were also very long. “A lot of folks that come around here are going there. It’s like a modern pilgrimage. Would you like to hear about the pilgrimages from the Ancient times?”

“No, thank you,” Sam said, taking the keys and grabbing Dean by the arm. “Uh… maybe tomorrow. We’ve had a long day.”

“Alright,” the lady replied, in a singsong tone. “Have a good night!”

Sam threw the keys at Charlie and dragged Dean directly into the room.

“What’s up with you?” Dean asked, looking at his brother with irritation.

“I didn’t want to alarm the others,” Sam said. “But I think there’s something fishy going on here, with that lady…”

“Sam, if you lived on a motel by the road, you would be weird too.”

“That could be it, but…”

“Look, I have the mother of all headaches right now,” Dean groaned, dropping his bag by the side of the bed, and lounging himself on the mattress. “If there’s something creepy here, it’s going to be there in the morning.”

“But, Dean…”

“Four hours, Sam!” Dean protested, grabbing a pillow and covering his head with it. “I need my four hours!”

He turned his back on his brother and stopped moving. Sam sighed and wondered if maybe he should be doing the same thing. Maybe his tiredness made him paranoid. That was probably it.

He still took out his laptop and wrote “America’s biggest ball of yarn” on the search bar.

 

* * *

 

“I don’t know, I thought this trip would be funnier, that we’d be seeing interesting things and whatnot,” Meg complained, bouncing up and down on the double bed she’d be sharing with Castiel. “So far it’s just been Dean being grumpy and an excessively large ball of yarn.”

“It’ll be funnier when we get there,” Charlie promised, taking out her towel from her bag. “Okay, I’m going to take a shower, so whatever you two are going to do, do it fast.”

“Do you think we’re animals?” Meg shouted as Charlie closed the door. Then she turned to Castiel. “Hey, you wanna?”

“Hmmm?” Castiel asked, raising his head from the chair where he was sitting. “I’m sorry, what?”

“You know, that lack of interest could be insulting if I didn’t know you’re worried about something,” Meg said, standing up and walking towards him. “What’s wrong?” she asked, sitting on his lap.

“Something feels… off about this place,” Castiel explained, distractingly wrapping his arms around Meg’s waist. “It’s too silent. Where are the other guests? Why aren’t more people coming to see the ball of yarn?”

“Maybe they took the right turn in the first place,” Meg sighed. “Don’t put much thought into it, Clarence.”

She was once more about to try to lure him into the bed, when a loud, high-pitched scream came from the bathroom.

“Charlie?” they called, as they barged in.

Charlie seemed okay, except for the fact she had her back against a corner and was staring at the bathtub with eyes popping out of their sockets.

“Did I ever tell you guys I hate spiders?” she asked.

Meg looked down, half-expecting to see a small little one lurking on a side and ready to mock Charlie. But there were actually several of them, small and big, covering the bathtub completely in brown and black, crawling all over the shower curtain. More were coming out of the faucet, instead of water.

“Okay, that’s odd,” Meg admitted, taking out her cellphone to snap a picture.

“I am not sleeping next to these things!” Charlie decided. “We’re marching up to the front desk and demanding a new room, right now!”

“Do these spiders look… strangely organized to you?” Castiel asked.

Before either of them could ask what he meant, the spiders banded together, forming a shape that resembled a perfect square, and crawled up the edge of the bathtub. Charlie was the first to flee the bathroom with a strangled yelp, but Meg and Castiel followed her quickly when the spiders tried to climb up their shoes. They closed the door, but the spiders started sliding down from beneath it. One of them, too big to fit, got stuck and started waving its legs in the air grotesquely.

“All in favor of setting this place on fire?” Charlie asked. Meg and Castiel raised their hands in the air, approvingly, and grabbed all their stuff before running out of the room.

 

* * *

 

Sam rubbed his temples tiredly. There were, apparently, several biggest balls of yarns around the country, but neither of them was nowhere near the road between Ohio and Arizona. The place didn’t even have its own website, which was probably why the owner needed to plant well-meaning “cousins” to direct people there. But that didn’t sound like a good business practice, so what was up with her?

There was a knock on the door. Dean was snoring loudly (perhaps even exaggerating a little), so Sam closed his computer and went to open.

“Hello!” the owner greeted him, again with that unnerving smile. She was still wearing the sunglasses. “I just thought maybe you would like some fresh towels, dearie,” she added, lifting them up so Sam could see them.

“Uh… yes, thank you,” Sam said, stepping aside so she could walk in. “That’s… very thoughtful.”

“We pride ourselves in our thoughtfulness!” the owner replied, already in her way to the bathroom. “I hope you’re enjoying your stay with us!”

The plural gave Sam a bad feeling. As far as he could see, there was no one in the motel except her, so what the hell…?

Something squeezed his throat. Sam gasped for air and tried to catch, but whatever it was, it was too thin yet too strong for him to break. And it just squeezed tighter, cutting into his neck, preventing the air to reach his lungs…

“Now, dearie,” said the owner, sweetly, somewhere behind him. “The more you struggle, the faster you’ll die. And what’s the fun in that?”

A bunch of black spots were obstructing Sam’s vision. His knees gave in. He tried to scream Dean’s name, but everything that came out of his throat was a strangled yelp. He hanged on to the side of the bed, trying to find something to use as a weapon…

The door burst open. A blinding light invaded the room. The owner shouted, and the pressure around Sam’s throat disappeared. There was a shattering of glass and only then Dean woke up.

“What?” he muttered, blinking around, confused.

“God, you’re rusty,” Meg commented.

Someone helped Sam to sit on the bed and patted him on the back. He coughed and breathed deeply, and with his vision cleared again, he saw Meg and Castiel standing in front of him, each with an angel blade in their hands, and Charlie by his side, with a spray can and a lighter carefully placed where she could quickly get them.

“What’s going on?” Dean asked.

“We’re killing the owner and burning the motel down,” Charlie notified him.

“Why?”

“’Cause she’s an evil, giant spider who wants to eat us.”

“We found dead bodies cocooned in spider web in the other rooms,” Castiel notified them, and Meg took out her cellphone to show the pictures she’d taken of them.

Dean rubbed his eyes and yawned.

“Okay, let me get my machete.”

 

* * *

 

Arachne wasn’t pleased. She liked it when her victims put up a bit of a fight. It kept things interesting. But this last group seemed like they were going to put _too much_ of a fight.

She had been so excited when those two giants had walked in the door. Even the small redheaded one would make a good snack. The two young ones had something odd about them, that was true. One of them smelled slightly like sulfur, and the other like ozone, like the air when a storm started gathering up. But she didn’t really think that they would be a problem.

She decided to start with the big ones, so she could satiate her hunger before moving on to the smaller targets. She was always stronger when she had eaten, and she figured it was better to confront them that way. Not because they scared her, mind you, but she hadn’t survive all those millennia without learning a lesson or two about prudence.

But they still had caught her by surprise. Whatever the small one was, he had an immense power about him. Arachne couldn’t wait to find out what his flesh tasted like.

She crawled up the walls, setting her webs strategically, waiting. The spiders, her friends, her allies, crawled all around her, ready to tend to her every command. She didn’t think it would be necessary to use them this time. She only needed to get them confused and scared, and they would run straight into their webs.

Sure enough, the small, redheaded was the first to appear. She was carrying some bug spray and a lighter, and was looking everywhere, like she expected to be jumped at any moment. Arachne couldn’t help a little snicker. Fire wouldn’t kill her. Hurt her a little, perhaps, but she would resist and ultimately grow stronger when she had consumed them all.

Finally, the redheaded stopped in the perfect angle for her to cast her web. Arachne licked her lips. This was going to be delicious.

 

* * *

 

Charlie looked around one last time and shuddered at the amount of spiders running around. However, the biggest, meanest spider was nowhere to be seen.

“Guys, it’s clear,” she informed out loud. “Heading back to the front desk now.”

She turned around… only to discover her path had been closed by a white, thick web. Small spiders ran around it, and Charlie shivered with disgust.

“Okay,” she said. “Trying another way now.”

The motel’s owner was waiting for her at the other end of the hallway. She had finally disposed of her sunglasses, and Charlie wished she hadn’t: three extra pairs of eyes surrounded her forehead and her temples, and all the pupils were staring directly at her. She turned around to make a run for it (maybe she could burn the web to break through it), but a thick, thin rope wrapped around her ankles and tripped her.

“Don’t struggle, little girl,” the spider hissed, as she dragged herself closer to Charlie. “I promise it will all be over soon, you’ll see.”

“I’d rather not,” Charlie replied.

She pointed the spray at her and turned on the lighter. The flames hit her straight in the face, and the spider stepped back with a scream of surprise and pain.

“You’ve made Arachne mad!” she shouted as Charlie staggered to her feet and ran like hell. “You will pay!”

She lunged herself after Charlie as fast as she could.

She never saw the blade of the machete coming at her throat.

Her headless body fell forwards, arms and legs spread, while her head rolled on the floor and ended at Charlie’s feet, who kicked it aside with a grimace of disgust. A pool of black, thick blood started soaking the carpet.

“I really hate spiders,” Charlie told Dean, who appeared around the corner with the machete in his hands.

Twenty minutes later, they were pouring gasoline over (one of) America’s Biggest Ball of Yarn, and making sure to salt the place in case one of her victim’s ghost had decided to stick around.

“I almost feel sorry for her,” Castiel commented as he emptied another salt bag around the corners of the room. “She was ancient, and probably very lonely…”

“I’m not,” Meg said, with a shrug. “She referred to herself in third person. She probably wasn’t all that sane, you know?”

“I thought you meant because she lured unsuspected travelers into her trap and fed of them.”

“Oh, yeah, that too,” Meg said, letting the last few drops of gasoline fall from the gallon. “Okay, I think that’s the last one.”

They walked outside, where the Winchesters and Charlie were setting up the latest details.

“So you brought all this stuff _just in case_?”

“Yes,” Dean replied, calmly hiding away the trunk’s false bottom. “And this just confirmed my theory: tourist traps are evil.”

Sam shook his head, muttering something about his brother’s paranoia not kicking in when it should, and turned on the lighter before throwing at the ball of yarn.

By the time the motel was engulfed in flames, they were several miles down the road, but Meg had her head out of the window and kept snapping pictures of the giant bonfire it had become with a wicked grin in her face.

“Best vacations ever.”


	23. Power

“And those are the donkeys we rode.”

“Cute!”

“So adorable!”

Meg mimicked vomiting into her plate, and Gary covered a snicker by faking a coughing fit.

There were a few disadvantages to one’s significant other and what was essentially half of the group of friends being in the cheerleading squad, as Meg had come to discover. One of them was that they had to share tables with other cheerleaders, and hear them talk about their summer vacations in Miami and Hawaii and Cancun and places with beaches and sea and a lot of seagulls. Compared to that, their road trip to the Grand Canyon had been an adventure. And they couldn’t even tell the r _eally_ fun parts.

“And what was that?” one of the girls (Ashlee with two e’s) asked when Castiel continued to show them the pictures.

“Oh, we took a wrong turn in New Mexico on our way back, and found this really big metal dinosaur,” he explained. “Meg and Charlie climbed it to try to put a hat in its head.”

“That sounds like so much fun,” Suzie whined, enviously. “Mom only let me go to the hotel’s swimming pool when all the cute bodyguards were already gone.”

“That’s because you’re a whore, Suzie,” Lita said, bluntly.

“I am not!” Suzie huffed.

“Girls, don’t be mean,” Peggy begged.

“Yeah, there’s nothing wrong with being a whore,” Meg intervened. “Own it, Suzie.”

“Yes!” Suzie said, only to stop in her tracks to consider what Meg had just said. “Wait, what?”

The debate on Suzie’s sexual habits was cut short by Tammy choking on her food. That wasn’t a euphemism: Tammy literally put a spoonful of the surprise beef stew and started coughing like she was trying to spit her lungs out. Her face got bright red and there were tears streaming down her face as she waved her arms in the air, calling for help.

“Tam, Tam!” Anita screamed, as she patted her in the back desperately. “Please, breathe!”

No one else was reacting so Castiel took it upon himself to help: he stood up and gently pressed an open palm on Tammy’s back, using the lightest beam of his powers on her. A second later, Tammy coughed again and the piece of meat stuck in her throat came out like a cannon ball out of her mouth and hit Marie Ann right on the forehead before falling in her own plate of stew.

The entire cheerleading squad exploded in exclamations of disgust (“Ew!” and “Yikes!” all around) while Marie Ann pushed her plate away from her and Anita hugged Tammy, crying.

“I thought you were going to die!”

“I’m… fine,” Tammy gasped. “Thank… thank you,” she added turning her face to Castiel.

“Well, no wonder you almost choked,” Meg said. She had fished a piece of meat the size of a fist from the depths of her plate. “What the hell is this?”

Gary imitated her, and threw his piece of meat on the table. It thumped.

“Are you kidding me?” he commented, grimacing. “You could kill a man with this thing.”

“How is it so hard?” Peggy asked, taking her glasses from her pocket and putting them on to analyze the pieces of meat as if they were a new Enochian spell she was trying to learn.

“They’re probably leftovers from last year,” Ashlee with two e’s said. “Due to budget cuts, the school has to use up all the food they have, even if its expired.”

“That is revolting,” Castiel said. Meg and he technically didn’t need to eat, but still.

“And how do you know that?” Meg asked.

“My brother was the School President until last year. He always complained how the counsel never listened to any of his proposals,” Ashley told them. “I guess there needs to be a new election now that he graduated.”

“Ugh, I would vote for anyone who promised to get us half a decent meal,” Lita complained.

Meg caressed her chin very lightly. Castiel watched her with a mix of concern and fear. He could almost see the wheels turning, or better put, the neurons making synapsis in her brain.

“What would you say if I told you I’ll run for School President?” she asked at the end of the day, as they rode their bikes back to bunker with Peggy in tow for her lessons.

“Well…” Castiel started.

“After all, I’ve been reading a lot of books about leadership,” Meg continued. “This could be a chance to apply the knowledge I’ve acquired, don’t you think?”

Castiel and Peggy exchanged what they hoped would be a discreet look, but Meg noticed anyway.

“What?” she snapped at them, as they stopped in front of the door.

“Well, Meg, no offense, but I don’t think many people would vote for you,” Peggy said, deciding a direct approach was the best policy. “You’ve made a lot of enemies during these years?”

“That’s not true,” Meg frowned. Peggy and Castiel exchanged a look, as if they couldn’t believe the depths of her denial. “Name one!”

“Well, there’re all the bullies you’ve terrorized, the teachers you’ve humiliated…” Peggy started numbering, as they made their way into the library.

“The entire football team,” Castiel added. “Coach Stevenson, who still thinks they could have won the season if you haven’t given up.”

“Not to mention you’re a little too… temperamental for the job,” Peggy continued.

“I am not temperamental!” Meg shouted. The lights on top of her head flickered, so she cleared her throat and feign calm. “I am passionate about things. It’s different. It shows I care.”

“Meg, you have a track record of all the times you’ve been in detention for destruction of school property,” Castiel reminded her. “That alone would disqualify you if you were to run.”

“Why?” Meg asked. “Because a School President should have respect for the institution or something? That can be faked, you know? I’m a demon. I can lie.”

“That’s another thing,” Peggy continued, as she sat down in the library table and put her backpack next to her. “You come off a little… power hungry.”

“Of course I’m power hungry,” Meg replied. “I’m power _starved_. Did you not hear the story about the years of denial of what’s rightfully mine?”

“Hey. What are you three on about?” Dean asked, coming into the library with Sam in tow.

Castiel explained Meg’s plans to him, and Dean immediately made a face. He didn’t suppress it fast enough, and that was how Castiel knew it was hopeless now. If Dean didn’t think she could do it, Meg would for sure find a way to prove him wrong.

“Maybe you could try starting with something smaller?” Sam suggested, a little more accommodating, but still not bowing to Meg’s wishes far enough for her taste. “Like… running for class president first, and then next year for School President.”

“Oh, yeah, that you could definitely win,” Peggy said. “The whole class is terrified of you. They would vote for you out of pure fear.”

Meg considered it. She did like it when people fear her, but that was not the point.

“No, I have to aim higher,” she said, after considering it for exactly two minutes. “I can’t let doubt holds me back. A leader has to be confident.”

“I don’t think you have that problem,” Dean said.

Meg rolled her eyes at him supremely.

“You know what? I don’t need that,” she said, rising a finger as if Dean was a little kid interrupting the adults. “I’m going to my room so you can start with your little exorcist lessons and what not, and by dinner, I am going to have come up with a perfect plan to win the election.”

And she strode away with her shoulder square and her head held high.

“Are you as scared as I am?” Dean asked, cringing.

“Don’t worry. It’s not likely that they’ll even let her postulate,” Sam commented. “Not with her file.”

Castiel and Peggy weren’t so sure Meg wouldn’t find a way around that.

 

* * *

 

“You would vote for me, wouldn’t you?” Meg asked alter that night, after the Winchesters had gone to bed and Castiel, as usual, slipped in her bedroom.

Castiel took too long to answer for Meg’s liking.

“Cas?” she asked, turning around. It was dark but she still caught the glimpse of hesitation in Castiel’s face.

“I mean, I guess I would,” Castiel said, and he realized he better clarify what he meant before Meg kicked him out of the room and he ended up sleeping alone. “It’s just… I don’t think you’re doing this for the right reasons.”

“Demon, remember?” she said. “I never do _anything_ for the right reasons, and if your morally uptight ass can’t get with that…”

“What I meant to say is, you would probably not do what’s best for the school in general,” Castiel continued, just trying to avoid a fight at this point. “You’re doing it because you want a position of power, not because you care about the student’s needs.”

Meg stared at him for five minutes, and Castiel was prepared to have the door slamming in his face at any second now.

Instead, Meg grabbed both his cheeks and gave him an enthusiastic kiss.

“You’re brilliant!” she said, before turning on her night lamp and jumping out of bed. “I knew I loved you for a reason.”

Castiel was so stunned by that last declaration that he almost forgot to ask in what exactly consisted his brilliance. Meg was hunched over the desk, scribbling something at full speed of her hand.

“Uh, Meg?”

“That’s how I’m going to win,” she muttered, without taking her eyes off what she was writing. “By convincing everyone I care about their problems and what they want from the school.”

Castiel got up too, at first to try and spy what she was writing over her shoulder, but then he noticed the bin underneath her desk. It was overflowing with crumpled papers, and the cats were playing with one of the balls. He grabbed it and opened it: in Meg’s hurried handwriting there were several crossed out ideas, like “Asking Principal Gonzalez for help” and “Bribe everyone with cupcakes.”

She hadn’t been lying. She had really been trying to come up with a plan while he studied with Peggy.

“What do you think?” she asked basically shoving her notebook underneath Castiel’s nose. It was a survey, presumably to hand out to the students. It asked several things about what they thought they should do with the school budget to what was their opinion on certain school policies.

“It… seems rather complete,” he commented.

And that’s when he realized even if maybe Meg was a little misguided on her intentions, this was important to her. She was going to do her best, because it meant that if she could do her best there, she could do her best in Hell.

“I think it’ll be perfect for you to develop a platform,” Castiel said. “I could convince the squad to help you find enough students to answer them so you can know, statistically, what are their bigger concerns.”

“You know, you’re really cute when you talk nerdy,” Meg said, standing up and wrapping her arms around Castiel’s neck. Castiel was about to hug her tighter and kiss her, but she snatched the notebook from his hands and sat on her desk again. “You go to sleep, I need to come up with a couple more of these and make them sound… you know, like they’re not being interrogated.”

“That’s wise,” Castiel approved. “Can I help you…?”

“No, it’s fine,” Meg replied, toying with the pen as she stared at the page. “I can figure this out.”

“Alright,” Castiel said, sitting back on the bed. “Goodnight.”

“Yeah…” Meg replied vaguely, as she scribbled hastily.

Castiel stared at the back of her head for a very long time. He ended up accepting that Meg really could go from declaring her love for him to completely acting like he wasn’t even in the room in ten seconds flat. He also accepted he was never going to stop being perplexed by her.

And later that night, when she slid by her side on the bed and left a single peck in his earlobe, he decided he was completely fine with that.

 

* * *

 

Meg’s ruling came to an abrupt ending before it even began.

“Look, I know you are well-liked by some of your classmates and you’re charismatic and energetic. You’re unapologetic and constantly defying boundaries,” Principal Gonzalez told her when Meg went to see her to present her nomination (She had even filled the paperwork by hand and everything). “To be honest, those are pretty important characteristics in a leader. But you’ve had behavioral problems in the past. The rules are clear: the school’s president has to have a clean record.”

“Oh, come on, I’ve never done anything that bad,” Meg argued.

Well, she had never been caught on the severe things, just the small ones: talking back to teachers, fighting with bullies (that whole stupid policy about not caring who’d started it), the occasional escaped frog in the science lab. She didn’t think it was that much of a problem, and apparently, neither did Principal Gonzalez.

“What can I tell you?” she sighed. “I like you, but several of the other professors don’t. Miriam… Professor Biggers, I mean, is even a little bit scared of you, for some reason.”

“She’s actually scared of all the students,” Meg pointed out.

“Point being, I can’t convince them to change the rules just so you can run,” Principal Gonzalez said. “Many will actually oppose to it to keep you from running. And in case you won, they wouldn’t let you implement the changes you propose out of spite.”

“Huh,” Meg muttered, disappointed but not really surprised. “So that’s what Castiel meant when he said I should be nicer.”

Principal Gonzalez looked at her over her glasses.

“Do you want a piece of advice?” she said, lowering her voice. “Wait for your moment.”

Meg leaned closer to the desk.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, Principal Beynart, God rests his soul, was a weary old man who had no idea what happened in his school by the end of his career, but refused to let anyone know that,” Principal Gonzalez said, pointing at a picture in the bookshelf that showed her with a greying man whose teeth looked terrifyingly false. “Who do you think ran things around here while he was busy dealing with his fourth divorce?”

“You?” Meg guessed.

“Exactly,” Principal Gonzalez smirked. “Here between us, there were times where I wished I could sneak in his house and murder him in his sleep.”

“Yeah, I know the feeling.”

“But I waited,” Principal Gonzalez concluded. “And my time came. Patience is a virtue, Meg, and power comes in many forms. Perhaps faculty members will oppose you less if you weren’t… upfront in this matter. Do you catch my drift?”

“I definitely do. Thank you,” Meg said, with a glimmer in her eye she couldn’t help. She stood up and walked towards the door. “You know,” she added, before leaving. “If you weren’t a Catholic, you might be an excellent demon.”

Principal Gonzalez smiled. The slang kids came up with these days.

 

* * *

 

“How it went?” Castiel asked when Meg emerged from the office.

“I need a patsy,” Meg declared, and looked directly at Peggy.

Peggy stepped backwards, scared.

“Oh, I don’t think…”

“You’d be perfect,” Meg said, grabbing her by the arm. “You’re smart, the teachers like you…”

“I have debilitating stage panic,” Peggy reminded her. “Do you remember that time when we were eleven and we had that Christmas play?”

“Yeah, you were Rudolph.”

“I ran off the stage in the middle of a panic attack,” Peggy reminded her.

“I remember that,” Castiel nodded. “You crash into three elves and broke one of their wrists.”

Meg sighed and admitted that Peggy maybe wasn’t the best candidate for this.

“There’s gotta be someone,” she said, scratching her head. “Someone who is just mildly apathetic, not all that remarkable and will just do whatever I tell them without protesting.”

Gary turned around the corner with a yawn.

“So that Calculus class was a bore,” he commented. “Uh, Meg? Why are you looking at me like that?”

“No reason,” Meg lied with a grin. “You do have a clean record, don’t you, Gary?”


	24. Dirt

“Meg, is there any particular reason you’re using the oven?”

Meg looked up from her notebook.

“I’m making mini-cupcakes,” she explained.

“Okay,” Dean said. He had learned long ago that question Meg’s motives for anything was a surefire way of getting sassed or grossed out by too much information. “Well, I need to make dinner, so…”

“They should be ready soon,” she said, lowering her gaze again.

Dean was about to walk out when he did a double take at what Meg was writing.

“Are you… doing your Math homework?” he asked, because he couldn’t believe what his eyes were seeing. He hadn’t seen Meg willingly and quietly doing her homework in months. He wasn’t even sure how she managed without ever handing it.

“It’s not my Math homework,” she replied, with a sigh that indicated she was as incredulous about the circumstances as Dean was. “It’s Gary’s.”

“Why are you doing Gary’s math homework?” Dean asked, because that didn’t clarify anything about the situation.

“’Cause it’s the only way he’d agree to run for School President,” Meg said. Dean stayed right where he was, because he was so confused this time he was demanding more information. Meg put the pencil down. “He promised he would do and say exactly what I tell him, as long as I did his homework for as long as the campaign lasts.”

“And you’re actually doing it?” Dean asked, astonished and a little bit worried. That was showing a moral fiber that he knew for sure Meg didn’t have.

“A Queen has to keep her word,” Meg replied, lifting her chin in a way that did make her look a bit like royalty.

“Wow, Meg, I’m…”

“Besides, we never said that the homework had to be _well_ done,” she added.

Yeah, that was more like it.

“And what, the cupcakes are part of the arrangement too?”

“Nope, those are for the voters,” Meg replied happily. “I’m going to cajole them with sweetness. Our motto is ‘Gary Cares’.”

“Cares about what?”

“Hell if I know,” Meg shrugged, as she continued to write what (Dean was now sure) were random numbers on the papers. “Whatever _they_ care about.”

The oven bell rang, and Meg got up to get them out of the oven.

“Should we be worried about this?” Dean asked Sam later that night, while they were doing the dishes.

“Why are you worried about it?” Sam pointed out. “Cupcake-bribing notwithstanding, she’s actually playing this by the rules. She’s excited about something and focusing on getting it. I’ll say this is a good thing.”

“Yeah, but… what if it backfires somehow?” Dean insisted. “What if despite all her efforts, she loses?”

Sam put down the glass he had been rinsing.

“Are you actually worried about Meg’s _feelings_?”

“Hell yeah, I’m worried about her feelings,” Dean replied, nodding. “’Cause we’re the ones who are gonna have to deal with her being surly and apathetic all the time.”

“So you mean, usual flavor Meg,” Sam pointed out, although he couldn’t help but to crack a smile. “I think it’s nice you care about her.”

“I don’t care about her, I care about how our lives are going to be miserable if she’s miserable,” Dean corrected him. “Sam, you can drop the smile. I don’t care.”

“You care a little bit,” Sam accused him. “You can’t not care when you’ve been living with her for the past…” He stopped to make some calculations and his eyes opened wide in surprise. “Seven years.”

“Woah,” Dean agreed, and leaned against the sink. “Do you remember when our biggest problem with them was how to get them to go the fuck to sleep?”

“Yeah,” Sam laugh. “And now they’re going to homecoming dances and all.”

Dean froze staring at him.

“What did I say?” Sam asked, suddenly a bit scared.

“Homecoming is next month!” Dean reminded him. “We have to get them shopping for dresses and a tux for Cas, obviously, and…”

“Dean, there’s plenty of time…”

“But what if there isn’t?” Dean argued. “What if there aren’t any good dresses left by the time the dance comes around?”

“Dean, do you really want to pry Meg away from her school conquer plans to drag her to buy dresses?”

Dean’s anxiety visibly deflated.

“No.”

“Thought so,” Sam said, passing him another dish to dry.

 

* * *

 

Meg took note: the mini-cupcakes attracted a rather important crowd, but she needed to reduce the politics she was trying to discuss to bite sizes if she wanted to stick them around while they ate.

“Remember, Gary cares!” she said, giving out another survey. She turned to Castiel desperate. “Oh, God, my mouth hurts from all the smiling.”

“Do you think the buttons were a bit too much?” Peggy asked, because maybe her boyfriend was just running nominally, but she was still decided to support him.

“No, but the little flags may be,” Gary said, completely aghast. “Guys, I really appreciate what you’re trying to do here for me…”

“Oh, we’re not doing it for you,” Meg said, and she smiled again and handed surveys when more people came to get some mini-cupcakes. “We’re doing it for the school.”

“Woah, that’s actually a really nice sentiment, Meg,” Gary said. Peggy and Castiel exchanged looks of disbelief.

“Hey, guys,” Meg greeted Tammy and Anita when they got close to their table. “I’d offer you cupcakes, but we already count with your vote, right?”

“That depends,” Tammy said, and she glared at Gary with eyes that cut like lasers. “What is your opinion with same-sex couples going together to school dances?”

Gary hesitated, but Meg reacted quickly.

“We’re in favor of that, of course,” she said. “What Gary’s trying to say is that the school’s policies on that are outdated and should be changed.”

“Yeah, totally,” Gary nodded, and pointed at his button. “I care, see? But why do you care?”

Anita and Tammy interlocked their hands and stared at them like daring to say something.

“Woah, you’re dating? That’s awesome!” Peggy exclaimed. “I’m really happy for you guys.”

“Since when?” Castiel asked, a little confused.

“Since Tam almost choked to death and I realized I loved her,” Anita declared, matter-of-factly.

“I didn’t almost choke to death,” Tammy said, rolling her eyes. “But we would really like to go to the Homecoming dance together, so if you’re for it…”

“Absolutely,” Gary nodded, after Meg subtly elbowed him in the ribs.

“Great,” Anita added. “Because if we go to Ruth, she’s probably just going to tell us we’ll burn in hell.”

“For being gay? Nah,” Meg shrugged. “But they do have serious rules about being a religious hypocrite. Huh… wait a minute…”

Castiel and Peggy braced themselves for her latest idea.

 

* * *

 

Ruth Pines was the one other candidate Meg was worried about. There was one other candidate, Lloyd Thompson, but he was a huge nerd whose platform mainly consisted in forming a school’s Mathletes team and giving it a lot of budget, so Meg wasn’t too worried about him. Ruth, on the other hand, was a soft-spoken straight-As student who had a reputation for being nice with everybody. Unless you were gay. Or practice another religion other than Christianity. Or were known to have lost your virginity out of wedlock.

The more Meg thought about it, the more people she could think of to rally against Ruth.

“It’s perfect, Cas,” she said that day, rubbing her hands as she looked at a picture of Ruth in the yearbook. “We can use her own bigotry against her. We only have to dig up some dirt on her…”

“Meg, wouldn’t it be easier if you just focused on strengthening Gary’s position and proposal?” Castiel suggested, as he turned the pages of the book they were supposed to be reading for English class.

“Yes, we’re going to do that too,” Meg rolled her eyes, like what Castiel what suggesting was completely lame and boring. “But it never hurts to have a back-up plan. So, what can you tell me about Ruth?”

“Why are you asking me?” Castiel raised his eyes, frowning in confusing.

“You’re a cheerleader, aren’t you?” Meg pointed out. “Don’t you guys know like every hot gossip that goes around the school?”

“That is a very mean stereotype and I cannot believe you’re bringing it up,” Castiel said, righteously offended. Meg waited. “The only thing I can tell you is that Ruth tried to join the squad and was rejected,” he added, turning his attention back to the book.

“That’s interesting,” Meg said, taking notes. “Did they happen to mention why? She couldn’t jump high enough or what?”

“No, apparently, she _was_ physically fit,” Castiel said. “But she had some extreme ideas about changing the uniforms and what words we should or not use in our cheers.”

Meg smiled, remembering the cheers Castiel had written for her. She’d reckon someone like Ruth wouldn’t exactly approved of it, but she thought it had been sweet.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Castiel asked.

“I was just wondering if you wanted to take a break so we can watch TV and make out on the couch,” Meg asked, point blank.

“Then we wouldn’t be watching TV,” Castiel said, although he did push the book away a little. “And aren’t you supposed to be busy writing Gary’s speech?”

“Well, you know, hormones,” Meg shrugged. “You’re going to have to help me with those if I want to concentrate.”

Castiel stared at her for a moment, and then laughed it off very low. Meg leaned over to give him a kiss…

“Alright, tweens, scoot,” Dean said. He dragged a chair and planted it right between the two of them before heavily dropping what seemed to be a scrapbook on the table and pushed it towards Meg.

“What is that?” Meg asked, staring at it with a mix of horror and disgust.

“I figured since you’re so busy with the campaign, you wouldn’t want to go shopping for dresses,” Dean replied. “So I printed out some models for you to check out and see if you like any. That way, when we actually go shopping, you’ll already have an idea what you’re looking for.”

Meg grabbed her notebook and pens and stood up, offended.

“I am very busy trying to actually do something for the school, Dean,” she growled at him. “I don’t have time to go looking through dresses with you.”

She walked away muttering under her breath about being incapable of believing Dean’s shit.

“Well, that’s too bad. Guess I’ll have to ambush her when she’s less cranky,” Dean sighed, but he opened the scrapbook anyway. “So Cas, let’s see if we can find a suit you like.”

 

* * *

 

During the week before they were supposed to give their speeches and debate, the support for Ruth Pine’s campaign declined steadily. It turned out her proposal of making a Bible study group after school was (as Meg happily pointed out to anyone who would listen and as she made sure everybody repeated as often as possible) borderline unconstitutional, as was her denial of her fellow student’s right to go with whoever they wanted to the Homeschool dance.

“Plus, our mini-cupcakes are way better than her cookies, _and_ calories free,” she said, as she handed them out to the cheerleaders who had approached Gary’s table pushed there by Tammy and Anita.

“That is so cool,” Suzie nodded approvingly. “Ruth says she wants to make the dress code even more strict, and I was like _‘But I want to wear this skirt, I just lost three pounds so I could fit in it!_ ’”

“And it really shows,” Meg said, and elbowed Gary on the ribs.

“The dress code is actually one of our main concerns,” he said automatically. “In fact, we believe it should be more relaxed so our female students don’t lose classes. And… the word is actually _stricter_.”

Suzie stared at him like he was the second coming. “You are so smart!” she said, popping the mini-cupcake in her mouth. “I am definitely voting for you!”

“Meg, I’m not sure about this,” Gary said once Suzie walked away. “Can we really keep all of these promises if I get elected?”

“That’s not important,” Meg said. “A promise during a political campaign just means we have the intention of doing something. As long as we _intend_ to do it, then we can promise whatever we want.”

“That’s not how it works,” Gary said, squinting his eyes at her.

“Oh, don’t get morally righteous with me now,” Meg complained. “Ruth’s doing enough of that. We don’t want to be Ruth, remember? We want to be the exact opposite of Ruth. The anti-Ruth.”

“So we have to be morally ambiguous about everything we do?” Gary asked, frowning.

Meg could feel Gary questioning their motives, and she wasn’t exactly sure what to tell him to keep him motivated, except offering to take on more of his homework, but then, she didn’t have to: Ruth Pines herself walked towards their stand.

“Well,” she said with her voice like a baby bird about to choke, flipping her long blonde hair backwards. “I’ve heard you have a most interesting platform, Gary.”

“Oh, yes, hi, Ruth,” Gary said, awkwardly. “Hmmm… do you want a pamphlet? Peggy designed them and printed them. I’m not entirely sure what they say because Meg wrote them, but I think they look really pretty.”

Ruth picked the pamphlet between her perfectly manicured nails like it was a disgusting piece of garbage she had to throw away.

“Thanks,” she said. “But I’m not allowed to take anything containing liberal ideas to my house.”

“I’ll say,” Meg snickered.

Ruth’s big green eyes moved towards her, looked at her up and down, and then she continued speaking to Gary like he was the only one present.

“Gary, I’m your opponent but not your enemy,” she said, kindly. “And as such, I would like you to know that you don’t need to do this.”

“Do… what?” Gary asked, even more confused than before.

“This whole… thing you’re doing,” Ruth replied, with a contemptuous gesture towards the stand. “You do realize you will be unable to implement all these policies you’re proposing, right?”

“Well…” Gary started, with an I-told-you-so gaze at Meg.

“He will try to, because he cares about making this school a better environment for all of our classmates,” Meg replied, sticking her chin up in the air and showing Ruth a little confident smirk. “Unlike you, Ruthie.”

“Meg, please, everybody knows you forced him to run because you couldn’t,” Ruth replied. “In any case, you and your friends are beyond salvation…”

“You have no idea,” Meg snickered.

“… but I don’t like it that you’re dragging a good boy like Gary into your sinful ways,” Ruth continued.

“Sinful? Wait a minute,” Gary interrupted her. “We just don’t want anybody to choke on the school’s food.”

“I don’t mean that, Garreth,” Ruth replied, almost losing her patience at Gary’s thickness. “I mean the promise you made to let those dirty couples come to the dances together.”

“Dirty? Hold on, Tammy and Anita are really good girls, and like, who cares who they date?” Gary argued. “They should go to the dance together if they want to.”

“See? That’s exactly what I mean,” Ruth argued. “If we allow them to go to the dance together, they will start thinking is tolerable to… ugh, I don’t know, kiss in front of everybody or do other dirty things.”

Gary stared at Ruth open-mouthed, like he couldn’t quite believe she was actually arguing that.

“You know what, Ruth?” he said. “I think we’re not going to agree on that.”

“The Lord says it’s our duty to save our brothers from sins…”

“The Lord talks a big game about loving thy neighbor for a guy who once drowned all of humanity,” Meg interrupted her. “Mini-cupcakes? I baked them myself.”

Ruth looked at them like they were a live poisonous snake.

“Think about it, Gary,” she said, once again ignoring Meg. “I know your intentions are good, but this particular road will surely lead you to Hell.”

She turned around (her blonde hair floated around her face like a halo) and walked away swaying her hips in her appropriately long skirt.

“Ten dollars say she rehearsed that before saying it,” Meg snorted, but when she looked at Gary, she something that had been completely absence from his face up until that point. “Gary? Hey, don’t mind her. We can just ask Tammy and Anita to make out furiously where she can see them. I’m sure that’ll irk her.”

“No,” Gary said, shaking his head. “That is not enough, Meg. We have to win.”

Meg blinked a couple of times, stunned, before a slow grin appeared in her face.

“Let’s get to work then.”

 

* * *

 

The days leading up to the debate were frantic. Or at least Sam saw them that way, because apparently with Halloween so close many witches and other supernatural creatures were preparing to wreak havoc, so his hunter’s network had a lot to do before Samhain. So he researched and made calls and in an occasion or two had to ask for Mrs. Periwinkle to send her familiar to intervene.

It didn’t help that life at the bunker had suddenly turned chaotic. Meg was at Gary’s home more often than not those days, but when they weren’t, Meg usually stayed up late, rereading her books about leadership and politics and highlighting parts to incorporate them into Gary’s speeches. She baked enough batches of mini-cupcakes to feed the entire school, and kept texting Gary about ideas and what he could and could not do.

“Idiot,” she muttered under her breath. Sam looked up from the book where he was reading about autumn rituals in Paganism. “He wants to wear a stupid tie with cartoon characters,” Meg explained. “He says it’ll make him look more approachable.”

“Well, thank goodness he has you, then,” Sam laughed.

“His heart is in the right place,” Meg shrugged. “It’s his head that needs me to put brilliant ideas and words in it. Of course, it helps that our opponent is a hateful troll who can only spout Bible verses instead of making a coherent argument.”

“So you’re not worried about the result?”

“Absolutely not,” Meg replied, proudly.

“Really? ‘Cause you’ve rewritten that thing five times already,” Sam pointed out. “And you seem like you could get some rest.”

“I am perfectly fine!” Meg snapped.

“Okay,” Sam said, turning back to his book. “But if you’re so sure, you could take five minutes of your time to go through the dresses with Dean so he can…”

Meg closed her notebook with a thump and stood up so fast she almost knocked down the chair.

“I don’t need this,” she groaned. “I have already informed Castiel and Dean I am not going to the stupid dance, therefore, I will not need a stupid dress. And since I’m your favorite, you’re supposed to be on my side and not harass me about it.”

“Sorry,” Sam said, a little amused as Meg stormed out of the library.

Her denial was in fact amusing in the face of Dean and Castiel’s relentlessness. Her protest had fallen on deaf ears with them. Peggy, Castiel and the rest of the cheerleading squad were preparing decorations, while Dean had volunteered to be one of the chaperones. Basically, that meant he had a lot of meetings with different soccer moms every other night, in which they discussed what appropriate behavior was, when a chaperone should intervene and what the extreme cases in which they should kick a kid out of the dance were. In the meantime, they tried to feed Dean into a stomachache.

“I swear, if I have to try one more of Barbara’s brownies, I will shoot myself,” he told Sam one night after coming back from those meetings. “She cooks them with stevia! What kind of monsters does that?”

“Which one was Barbara again?” asked Sam, as he wrote down a couple of repelling spells that could protect the bunker in case Mrs. Periwinkle decided to invite some of the more dubious elements of the Grand Coven into town.

“The blonde one, Suzie’s mother,” Dean groaned. “I’ve told you about her. She’s all over me whenever I walk into the room. At least Pam doesn’t try talking to me anymore.”

“And which one was Pam?”

“You remember her, from Meg’s game last year,” Dean replied. “She’s convinced we let our niblings carry on an incestuous relationship.”

“Niblings?” Sam repeated, instead to pointing out that Pam was not entirely wrong.

“Yeah, you know, as in… siblings, except for your… niblings,” Dean explained. “It’s the, uh… neutral term.”

“Okay,” Sam replied. He was not convinced that was a word at all, but he was going to let Dean have that one.

“But you know which one is the worst of them all?” Dean continued. “Kim Pines. What a handful. She keeps saying things like _‘It is vital that we make sure that the kids always leave some room for Jesus when they dance’_ ,” he said, imitating a high-pitched tone of voice. “They’re teenagers! They’re hormone-ailed! If they want to do it in the car after the dance, nobody’s going to stop them. I mean _we_ couldn’t stop our teenagers, what chance does Jesus stand?”

Sam snorted, but then he noticed something.

“Wait a second, Kim Pines?” he repeated, turning his chair around. “Does she have a daughter named Ruth?”

“Oh, yeah,” Dean rolled his eyes. “Perfect, adorable, little Ruth. She’s so good and so pure and so much better than any of the other’s kids.”

“She’s going up against Gary in the School President’s election,” Sam informed him.

Dean lifted his head very slowly.

“Is she now?” he asked, and leaned on the couch’s arm, pensively. “Interesting.”

“Dean?” Sam asked, cringing a little. Dean was machinating something, and when he did, he could be worse than Meg sometimes.

“Say, what do you think Meg would be willing to do if I can provide her with some dirt on Ruth?”

“Dean, no,” Sam said. “You’re not bribing Meg into going to the dance.”

“Come on, it’s a big deal!” Dean groaned. “It’s their first school dance, she can’t just miss it!”

“We missed all of our school dances,” Sam reminded him.

“Yeah, and it sucked.”

“You kept saying they were lame anyway,” Sam sighed. “She obviously doesn’t care, so why do you?”

“You didn’t see Cas’ face when he told me Meg didn’t want to go,” Dean said. “He was so sad, it was heartbreaking.”

“So you’re doing it to spare Castiel’s feelings,” Sam said.

Dean clenched his jaw, annoyed.

“Look, she’s an ancient demon with more bodies to her name than we can imagine,” he said. “She can totally survive a school dance.”

“You already picked her dress didn’t you?”

Dean refused to answer, but Sam knew that in all probability, Meg wouldn’t have much of a choice in the matter.


	25. Homecoming

Sam had to admit, however, that Dean went about the whole thing in a very sneaky way that Meg probably wouldn’t have been able to avoid, even if she had been aware of the fact that she was being manipulated. In fairness, manipulating the future Queen of Hell could be a skill that came in handy, but Sam really hoped they wouldn’t have to use it as much as they had in the past.

It was the night before the debate between the candidates, and the week before the elections. Meg was a pitiful sight: she was in the library, with her face sunk in her arms, surrounded by discarded drafts of Gary’s speech and looking every bit like she was about to give up on everything.

“Tough day?” Sam asked, as he took notes on traditional foods served at Samhain rituals. He was thinking about baking something for Mrs. Periwinkle.

“I brought this upon myself,” Meg said, in the most resigned depressed tone of voice she could think of. “This is what I get for making alliances with lawful good guys. He refuses to say anything bad about Ruth, even the stuff that’s true. I don’t think he realizes she’s going to attack his character at every chance she gets, from the fact he’s just the water boy who’s never done anything remarkable for the school, to the little detail that his campaign manager is an incestuous whore.”

“She’s not actually going to say that,” Sam tried to laugh it off, but Meg’s serious face indicated him she wholeheartedly believed that was how it was going to go down. “Well, even if she does, she’ll be just propagating malicious rumors, right?”

“It’s high school, Sam,” Meg groaned. “Malicious rumors thrive there. That’s why I tried to convince Gary to use to them, but he says people should vote on the strength of our platform alone.”

“He’s not wrong,” Sam said. “You do have a good platform.”

“Sam, you would _not_  believe how many of these assholes, professors included, are raging homophobes,” Meg complained. “I’m going to see all these people in Hell, and I’m not even gonna to stop to say hi.”

She stared at Sam like daring him to try and say another thing to cheer her up.

“Well… at least you gave Ruth a run for her money,” he said, with a shrug. Meg sank her head in her arms again.

And that was the moment the angel chose to make his entry. Sam would never know if he’d rehearsed it or if it was just a lucky coincidence, but Castiel walked in right when Meg was at his lowest point, sat by her side and put a hand on her shoulder to console her.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” he said. “There’s no way you could have found out the really ugly stuff on Ruth in time to incorporate it on your speech.”

Meg raised her head so fast she almost head-butts Castiel. “What really ugly stuff?”

Castiel hesitated, and that’s when Sam knew that Dean had been feeding him information.

“I don’t… feel comfortable revealing this,” he said, and he seemed so sincere saying it that Meg didn’t suspect there was anything at play except for Castiel’s own goodness.

“Cas, if you know anything, you need to tell me,” Meg said, grabbing her boyfriend by the arm. Sam could tell she was a second away from shaking him. “Just imagine how disappointed Anita and Tammy are going to be that they can’t go to the dance with the person they want.”

“I don’t really have to imagine that,” Castiel said.

And Meg realized too late that she had walked right into that. She closed her eyes, bit her lips like she was resisting the impulse of screaming and then looked back at Castiel as calmly as she could.

“Is that what this is about? Fine,” she groaned. “I’ll go to the stupid dance with you. I’ll even wear one of those lame dresses Dean wants to get for me. But you need to tell me what you know about Ruth.”

Castiel hesitated until Meg was practically shivering, and then he nodded, accepting the deal. She told Meg exactly what she needed to know, and he spoke, Meg’s eyes grew brighter and brighter.

“Really? The hypocritical bitch,” she mumbled when she finished, but it was clear she was delighted. “Oh, this is gold. Thank you.”

She grabbed Castiel by the cheeks and planted a kiss on his lips before turning around all her stuff with an energy Sam hadn’t seen on her in a while.

“Gary’s still not going to use it,” Castiel pointed out. “He’s above attacking his political opponents.”

“I know,” Meg smirked. “Good thing I am not above blackmail.”

And she sauntered away happily.

Castiel looked over his shoulders, and it was only then that Sam noticed Dean hiding among the shelves and showing the angel a thumbs-up. Sam shook his head, and hoped for their sake Meg never discovered they’d conspired against her.

 

* * *

 

 

The auditorium was filling up pretty nicely on the five minutes before the debate, and the candidates were making themselves ready. She had chosen a clean white dress that day, with a little crucifix hanging around her neck, and she seemed all primed are ready, with her cards in her hand and her air of absolute composure. Lloyd was a bit behind them, muttering to himself and pacing around in a circle like a hamster trapped in a ball.

Peggy adjusted Gary’s tie.

“Are you nervous?”

“No, I’m fine,” Gary shrugged.

“Oh, great,” Peggy nodded. “Because I would be totally freaking out, sweating and shivering and imagining every little thing that could wrong like tripping on my own feet and making a fool of myself in front of everybody or stuttering when I start to read my speech…”

“Thank you, Peggy,” Gary cut her off. He tried to shake those thoughts as he looked around. “Where’s Meg? She’s supposed to be here with the final version of my speech.”

“Guess some people are just not trustworthy,” Ruth commented.

“Speak for yourself,” Meg said, stepping out of the shadows and startling everybody.

“How did you get here?” Lloyd asked, blinking at Meg. “You didn’t come through the door, how...?”

Meg ignored him and went straight to give Gary his cards.

“You were right, I think we can win this on our platform alone,” she told him. “So just… read this and answers the questions honestly. You should be fine.”

“Really?” Gary looked at her open-mouthed, but then he smile. “Thank you, Meg, that is so…”

“Will the candidates please take their place?” Principal Gonzalez called from stage.

“You got this,” Meg said, showing Gary a thumb up. When Ruth passed her by, Meg grabbed her by the hand. Ruth stared at her with a mixture of disgust and confusion, but Meg just smirked wider at her. “And good luck to you too.”

“What did you do?” Peggy asked, as the three candidates took their places in the stage. Meg didn’t answer.

Ruth walked to the podium after Principal Gonzalez announced her name for everybody, and stood in front of the mic with a confidence that indicated she thought herself the winner already. Then she looked down at her notes.

All the color fled from her face. Her hands at the sides of the podium started shaking. She looked up at the public, then back at her notes, then back up again. Her eyes move from size to size, like she had suddenly forgot why she was there and what was she supposed to say.

“Miss Pines?” Principal Gonzalez called her. “You only have ten minutes.”

Ruth opened her mouth as if she wanted to start speaking, but she ended up looking more like a fish out of the water gasping for air. Then slowly, she turned her head towards where Meg and Peggy were watching, and Peggy could have sworn she saw pure terror in Ruth’s face. She leaned over the microphone and said only one thing:

“I-I… I hereby renounce to my candidacy,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

And then she ran off the stage like there were hellhounds yapping at her heels, her cards flying everywhere like a cloud of dust in a cartoon. Peggy leaned down and picked up the only one that had Meg’s handwriting in it.

“It’s just a list of medicines,” she said, frowning in confusion.

“Yes,” Meg confirmed calmly. “The funny thing is, those medicines are used to treat syphilis.”

“Okay,” Principal Gonzalez said as Peggy stared at Meg in complete disbelief. “Uh… Mr. Cooper, then? Your turn.”

 

* * *

 

After Ruth’s dramatic fleeing, Gary ran basically unopposed and won by overwhelming majority, which made Meg spent many days helping him set up the petition for same sex couples to assist to the dance and in generally feeling so satisfied she almost forgot what that meant to her.

“No!” she shouted in horror when Dean walked into the bunker with a smug smile on his face, holding two garment bags and a little plastic box.

“Yes!” he replied, with a manic glimmer in his eyes. “It’s Homecoming Day, and you’re going to go and you’re going _to have fun_!”

“I’m sick,” Meg argued, pushing her breakfast away from her. “I forgot it was happening and I ate too much. Now I’m sick and I can’t go. Sorry.”

“How can you have forgotten about it?” Castiel frowned. “There are signs all over the school reminding people to buy tickets. We’ve had two pep rallies.”

“I was blissfully ignoring those,” Meg huffed. Then a last straw presented itself for her to grasp at. “Wait, did you buy the tickets to the dance?”

“I didn’t,” Castiel said, but before Meg could be too relieved, he added: “As part of the organizing committee, I get free tickets.”

“So there,” Dean said, hanging the dress from the back of Meg’s chair and putting an arm around her shoulder. “A Queen must keep her word. You said so yourself.”

“I hate your guts,” Meg groaned.

“I know you do,” Dean said, still smiling. “Do you want me to do your hair and make-up too?”

The only reason Meg didn’t throw her bowl of cereal at his face was because Castiel happened to open the little plastic box. It contained a corsage shaped like a purple rose, and Castiel’s eyes just completely lit up when he saw it.

“You’re going to look so pretty with this!” he said, showing it to Meg.

Meg realized she was completely weak.

 

* * *

 

“Really?” Sam asked, a few hours later. “Where did you even get a tripod?”

“I have to be prepared, Sammy,” Dean replied as he placed the camera on it and carefully pointed it directly towards the hall from where Meg was supposed to emerge. “After all, it’s not like Meg is going to pose, is she?”

“Well, you already convinced her to wear the dress,” Sam pointed, as he turned his attention back to his book. “I’ll give it to you; that’s pretty impressive.”

Dean stared at his brother in disbelief for a second, like his absolute lack of enthusiasm or care was personally offending to him.

“It’s their first school dance, Sammy!” he said. “Aren’t you proud that they made it this far? Aren’t you proud that _we_ made it this far?”

“I guess,” Sam shrugged.

Before Dean could protest any further, Castiel popped his head out of the hallway. He was wearing a jacket suit and a purple tie.

“Uh, Meg’s a little self-conscious…” he said.

“I am not self-conscious!” she screamed behind him. “I just don’t want any stupid pictures taken of me!”

“So could you maybe…?” Castiel pointed at the camera, and with a growl of exasperation, Dean took it off the tripod. “Thank you. You can come out now, Meg.”

Meg still groaned and stomped her feet on her way out. The dress Dean had picked for her was legitimately cute, if Sam was being honest: it was strapless, knee-length and purple, matching both her corsage and Castiel’s tie. He wondered if Dean had done on purpose or if it had been an unconscious decision. In any case, they looked pretty good, even if Meg was slumping her shoulders and huffing loudly to express her discontent.

“These things you got me are way too small,” she complained, lifting a foot to show the high heels. “Don’t expect me to dance in them. Hell, don’t expect fucking _wear_ them all night.”

“I don’t expect anything,” Dean said, though he was clearly satisfied with the effect.

“Where’s your suit?” Castiel asked.

“Oh, I thought it’d be embarrassing if you two showed up with the chaperone,” Dean said, taking out the keys of the car from inside his jacket. “So, if you want to drive there on your own…”

Meg took a step to try and take the keys, but Dean held them right out of her reach. The anger in Meg’s face was precious.

“What’s your price?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at him.

“One picture,” Dean demanded. “It’s all I ask. It won’t kill you.”

Meg apparently was ready to kill Dean, but in the end, she grabbed Castiel’s arm and put it around her waist. When she smiled for the camera, she almost looked sincere.

“See? That wasn’t so bad,” Dean said, finally handing her the keys. “You look so good, kids.”

“Are you crying?” Castiel asked, tilting his head.

“No,” Dean lied. Sam knew he was lying because he could see the tears forming at the edges of his eyes. “Run along now. You want to be fashionably late, but not too late.”

“Oh, we’re going to be late,” Meg guaranteed as she dragged Castiel towards the garage. “But that’ll be because we’re stopping at the side of the road to have sex in the backseat of your car!”

“Have fun!” Sam wished as they disappeared. Dean flailed on the chair in front of him with a sigh.

“We did a good job,” he said. “Wanna ditch that book and grab a beer?”

“I thought you were supposed to go chaperoning,” Sam pointed out.

Dean shrugged, still smiling with satisfaction, and Sam decided he definitely had time for a beer.

 

* * *

 

The school’s gym was jam-packed when they arrived, so not many people noticed them coming in. The walls were adorned with messages encouraging the football team, and everything was covered in a soft blue light provided by the lanterns Castiel and the other cheerleaders had hanged from the ceiling.

“Ugh,” Meg muttered when they crossed the door.

“I am compelled to ask,” Castiel said, a little amused. “Why are you so against dancing?”

“I told you, it’s a useless human practice,” Meg replied. “All that unnecessary moving and touching and…”

Castiel grabbed her by the hand, and before Meg could protest, he dragged her forwards. The dance floor was crowded, although there seemed to be a space forming around Anita and Tammy, who were dancing together so furiously it was a miracle the didn’t take out someone’s eye. The angel found a clearer corner and pulled Meg closer to him.

“Dancing is entirely unnecessary,” he said. “A lot of things we do are unnecessary, Meg, but we do them because we enjoy them. How do you know you’re not going to enjoy dancing if you’ve never tried it?”

“There are so many things wrong with that argument,” Meg groaned, but the truth was she couldn’t come up with any on the fly.

“Also, I happen to know those shoes Dean bought you are exactly your size,” Castiel argued lowering his hands to place them on Meg’s hips. “I helped him choose them.”

“I knew it!” Meg exclaimed. “Not even Dean would pick something this lame.”

“Purple is your favorite color, is it not?” Castiel asked, frowning. “Why are you complaining, then?”

“Well, because…” Meg started, but she went quiet when she realized exactly what Castiel was doing: he had started rocking their bodies from left to right, so slowly she hadn’t even noticed. She was so shocked at Castiel’s smoothness she couldn’t even get mad. “Oh, I see how it is. Very sneaky, Clarence.”

“I am merely trying to show you dancing doesn’t have to be complicated or uncomfortable,” Castiel said, with a little shrug as if he had no idea what Meg was talking about. “Not with the right partner, at least.”

“And you are that partner?” Meg snickered. “You have many virtues, but modesty ain't one, angel.”

“I am merely stating what it is,” Castiel replied.

He took Meg’s hand and stepped backwards to make her spin on her heels. Meg didn’t oppose. In fact, by the time he was facing Castiel again, she was smiling. She stood very close to him and started swaying her hips very slowly.

“You are so damn proud of yourself, aren’t you?”

“I am… content,” Castiel said, as he moved to keep Meg’s rhythm. “I do feel like a celebration is in order.”

“How so?”

Castiel tilted his head, like he was thinking about the best way to articulate his answer.

“I believe we have grown the most in these past few years.”

“Really?” Meg laughed. “I was just waiting for it all to finish, and now we’re almost there. I feel relieved.”

“Yes, but that is not why this is a special occasion,” Castiel sighed. He supposed he should be used to Meg’s aloofness, but she still managed to frustrate him greatly.

Meg seemed to realize that, because she stopped dancing and leaned even closer to him.

“Okay, I'll bite,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Why do you believe that?”

“Well, I have learned about humanity and cooperation,” Castiel explained. “And you have learned about leadership and… also cooperation. And I have learned a lot about myself too. And about you.”

“Now you’re getting corny,” Meg warned him, throwing her arms around his neck. “But you’re right. I’ll count this year as a victory. If I get Gary to pass this new rule that says you can run for president as long as your history from the last year is clean and if I don’t get in trouble, I can run for myself next year.”

“I find it hard to imagine you not getting in trouble,” Castiel said.

“Me too,” Meg admitted. “But hey, it’ll be an adventure to try.”

The smile she gave him almost made Castiel forgot that they were in a room full of people that believed them to be cousins, and therefore a kiss would not be appropriate. Luckily for him, their friends came to interrupt the moment just then.

“Heya!” Anita shouted, as she practically threw herself at Meg. She was wearing a white dress that was actually an awful contrast with her platinum blonde hair, but she didn’t seem to care. Tammy, on the other hand, had a blue tux with a bowtie. They were both wearing corsages with the color of the other’s attire.

“I thought you hated dances and big agglomerations of humans!”

Meg was tempted to ask why she was speaking so loudly. It took her a second to realize the music was actually blasting everywhere, and the only reason she and Castiel had managed to hold a conversation was because of their supernatural hearing.

“I do hate them!” she replied, trying to scream as much as the others. “But he forced me to come!”

“It was not an easy task,” Castiel commented, but he said it so lowly only Meg heard him.

“Come on, you’re dancing with us!” Tammy declared, grabbing Meg by the arm. “We know it was actually Gary who made it so we could come together, but he wouldn’t have done without you!”

Meg looked over her shoulder and stuck her tongue out at Castiel while she disappeared among the dancers. Castiel smiled once again and headed for the snack table, where it was apparently a lot quieter.

Peggy was next to the punch, wearing a pink dress and squinting her eyes a lot. She didn’t recognize Castiel until he was practically standing two inches in front of her.

“Oh, hey,” she said. “Sorry, I can’t see much with all the lights and… uh…”

“Did you forget your glasses?” Castiel asked, confused.

“No, I just didn’t think they went okay with my dress,” Peggy admitted, and her face got as pink as her dress. “It was stupid.”

Castiel didn’t think it was stupid. He had been in the cheerleading squad long enough to know teenage girls were extremely self-conscious about their appearances, and he couldn’t blame Peggy for being the same.

“Perhaps I could try…” he said, raising his hand.

“No, don’t worry about it,” Peggy shook her head. “I’m fine.”

Gary skidded and halted next to them at that moment.

“There you are,” he said, taking out Peggy’s glasses from inside his jacket. Peggy lifted her head up at him, and Gary gently placed the glasses on her face. Castiel turned away to fill his cup to give them a moment to kiss.

“So how does it feel being the President, Gary?” he asked, when they could all speak again.

“It’s okay, I guess,” Gary shrugged. Meg would have probably smacked him for his lack of enthusiasm.

“Don’t be modest,” Peggy gently punch him in the arm. “It’s going to look good in your college application.”

“Yeah,” Gary scratched the back of his head and then changed the topic: “I don't think I'm a going to college kind of guy... hey, isn’t that your uncle?”

Dean was indeed climbing up to the DJ’s console and shouting something. The DJ turned off the music and passed him a microphone.

“Yes, hi,” Dean said. “This is just a reminder that taking two spaces in the parking lot is a dick move, so the owner of the red Corvette, could you please go and move it? Shame on you, son,” he added, when a kid quietly tiptoed towards the door. “And you need to pull your pants,” he added pointing at the DJ. “Nobody needs to be seeing that.”

Castiel could practically hear Meg face-palming somewhere in the dance floor. Two seconds later, she was next to them, with Tammy and Anita in tow.

“Let’s go get some fresh air,” she proposed. “Quick, before he sees us.”

The bleachers were practically empty, so it wasn’t hard to climb all the way to the top. The music from the gym was just a muffled rumor there, and they could follow the Corvette kid with their eyes running back to the dance. Gary took off his coat to put it around Peggy’s shoulder, while Anita leaned against Tammy to cuddle for heat. Castiel and Meg didn’t really feel cold, but they still sat so close to each other that they could hold hands away from any prying eyes.

“It’s funny, isn’t it?” Peggy commented. “Next year, Gary’s going to graduate, and the year after that, we are going to graduate too, and then the kids that are now in freshman could sit here and they won’t even now we sat here before them.”

“Margaret, shut up, you’re depressing me,” Tammy interrupted her. “Just… shut up.”

“But it is an interesting fact to think about,” Castiel said. “I have learned that human life is essentially entropic and unexplainable, so for all we now this could be the last night the conditions are met for the six of us to be together in a familiar environment.”

“What did I say?” Tammy replied, throwing a pebble at Castiel.

He smiled sadly, and Meg understood exactly what he meant: they were all going to grow up, but the four humans sitting right next to them were the only ones who were going to grow old and die. Well, unless they got involved in some sort of conflict with Heaven or Hell or both, in which case there was a high probability that they would die too, but they probably wouldn’t end in the same planes of existence as their friends’ souls.

Wow, Tammy was right. Those were depressing thoughts, so Meg shook them away, and just held Castiel’s hand tighter still. They stayed in silence, looking at the horizon and shivering a little on the autumn breeze.

“Hey, what’s that?” Anita asked, suddenly pointing out at some orange balls of fire rising up to the sky. There was only one, then another one joined it, and another and another.

“There we go,” Tammy said, apparently relieved. “That is something unexplainable that’s not depressing.”

Meg and Castiel exchanged looks, thinking the same thing: the balls were coming from around Mrs. Periwinkle’s house.

“Probably the early arrivals of the Grand Coven got drunk and are having some sort of pre-party,” Meg commented, in a whisper. “Poor _Pericles_ is gonna have a lot to clean up afterwards.”

Gary took out his cellphone and started filming them, at the same time Peggy glanced at Meg and Castiel with concern.

“Should we…?”

“Meh, Sam’s probably on it,” Meg shrugged. “I’m sure it’s nothing he can’t handle.”

“Besides, Dean seems to have his hands full with his chaperoning duties, but it’s a matter of time before he notices our absence,” Castiel continued. “So I suggest we do not disturb the entropy that brought us together to this moment before it is absolutely necessary.”

“Oh,” Peggy said. “Okay, then.”

So they stayed in awed silence, watching the balls of fire light up the sky like the sun had confused his schedule and risen up hours too early. Meg leaned against Castiel and he put a hand around her shoulder to hold her closer. That quiet town was about to experience some very strange occurrences. Eventually, they would have to deal with parting ways with their friends and also the Winchester. The future was coming at them like a freight train.

But that night, it was as far away as those lights.


End file.
